


We Are Either Here Or Not Here

by inplayruns



Category: Supernatural
Genre: (but mostly Dean), Angst with a Happy Ending, Background Relationships, Badass Mary Winchester, Canon Temporary Character Death, Coming Out, Eileen is alive because I say so, Impala Sex, Love Confessions, M/M, Mutual Pining, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Post-Episode: s12e23 All Along the Watchtower, Rimming, Sharing a Bed, Top Castiel/Bottom Dean Winchester, Touch-Starved Castiel, Touch-Starved Dean, author abuse of mixtapes, canon alternate universes, multiple POVs, praying, profound bonds, ref to suicidal ideation and homophobic attitudes/slurs (no actual slurs in fic), very brief Cas-cest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-27
Updated: 2017-10-27
Packaged: 2019-01-23 09:30:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 53,965
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12504324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inplayruns/pseuds/inplayruns
Summary: Post-12.23. After Cas’ death, Dean’s left devastated. So when Mary fights her way out of the other universe with an alternate Castiel in tow, Dean’s desperate enough to start talking to him. Castiel is stubborn, judgmental, infuriating - and the best shot Dean has at getting Cas back. The conversations start as Dean’s last hope, but they soon turn into his version of catharsis.When Cas does find his way back, he comes along with stories of his own. No sooner than he’s returned, though, new and unusual circumstances put distance between him and Dean. Moving forward together turns out to be easier said than done, and Dean’s left wondering if anything’s changed after all.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Title adapted from [We Are Hard on Each Other](http://peelsofpoetry.tumblr.com/post/57779021416/we-are-hard-on-each-other-by-margaret-atwood-i), by Margaret Atwood. 
> 
> WOO BOY, it's finally time to post this. Hey everybody and thanks for reading!
> 
> First off, I cannot thank [pantheonofdiscord](http://archiveofourown.org/users/pantheon_of_discord/pseuds/pantheon_of_discord) enough. She's a wonderful beta, brainstormer, and cheerleader; she's a great writer and an even better human. I have said it before but I am so incredibly glad we became friends through the DCBB! This fic would not exist without her.
> 
> To [Armellin](http://armellin.tumblr.com/), I have been a fan of your art for such a long time now and it's honestly been an honor to have you doing art for my fic. Thank you for your gorgeous creations and your enthusiasm! You can see the art [here](http://armellin.tumblr.com/post/166848901825/my-art-for-hufflepuffdeaninplayruns) and it's also embedded in the fic. It's safe for work but has fic spoilers. 
> 
> A big hug to all my friends for everything but a special thank you in particular to [Michelle](http://archiveofourown.org/users/captainshakespear/pseuds/captainshakespear) and [Mara](http://archiveofourown.org/users/peridium/pseuds/peridium) for the readthroughs and advice. [Anna](https://archiveofourown.org/users/clockworkrobots/pseuds/clockworkrobots), [Julie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/xylodemon), [Nicole](https://archiveofourown.org/users/saltyfeathers/pseuds/saltyfeathers), and [Ginny](https://archiveofourown.org/users/komodobits/pseuds/komodobits), thank you for all the moral support and the (better) ideas (than mine). I love youuuu.
> 
> This fic takes place immediately after 12.23 and contains spoilers for all aired episodes through S12, save Eileen's death because screw that. I ignored all S13 spoilers while writing this fic, so I only claim credit for the good stuff that happens this season. :P 
> 
> Thank you for reading, again. Hope you enjoy!

The lake’s gone quiet. The moon hangs high overhead, but there’s a weight to it, like it could start to sink any second. It still shines through the clouds, which rolled in not long ago. Mist drifts down, onto the beach, but it’s silent as it falls. 

Falls on Dean. Falls on the sand, on the dark wings charred into it. Falls on the _body_ next to him.

“Please,” Dean says. It’s the only words he’ll say for the next few days, until – until. “Please. Please. No.” His voice catches, sour in his throat; nothing else comes out. He had too many words, then he didn’t have the right words, and now there are no more words left to use.

He takes Cas’ hand after a while, and drops it immediately. It’s cold to the touch. It falls too easily, no tension behind the movement. Seems impossible that it ever belonged to someone who lived. 

He puts his hand in Cas’ hair instead. That feels better; that feels awful.

Amber flashes from behind Dean. The waves lick the shore. His knees ache like hell. Distantly, he knows he should care about all of this. 

Instead, he stays on the beach. He wonders what he could do for a grave, if he ever gets up: a wooden cross, a pile of rocks, a planted tree. Maybe he could burn him, release him to the air. No monument seems permanent enough. The mountains in the distance, almost invisible in the darkness and fog – one day they will crumble too. It’s a small comfort.

Dean wakes up and scrubs over his face with his hand. He’s sweating and somehow his left foot escaped its sock while he slept. 

Nightmares, they suck, but he can deal with them. It’s his memories that are the worst dreams of all. 

He hazards a glance at the clock by his bed. It reads 5:12, but whether that’s sunset or the ass-end of the morning he’s got no idea. Either way, he should probably get out of bed. Neither Sam nor Mom came by to check on him; it braids relief and insult alike together inside his chest.

Getting out of bed, finally, he stumbles to the kitchen. Sam’s in there. Dean isn’t too hurt by the double-take he does. “AM or PM?” Dean asks, throwing open cabinet doors.

“PM. What happened to your sock, man?” 

“Ran off when it saw you.” It’s a grumble, more to himself than out loud. 

Sam’s already put down the book he was reading. “Are you going to…” 

Dean’s heart jackrabbits in his throat. This is pathetic. He turns around, offering the best smile he can. “I just want some cereal right now, Sammy,” is all he says. 

He sits at the table with a box of – he wasn’t even paying attention. Cocoa Puffs, turns out. Good enough. He pours his cereal into the bowl and crunches noisily. The room’s quiet otherwise, even if Sam’s prolonged glances at him speak volumes. 

Dean hears them, the smooth chain rattles. The feathers rustling. The hitched breaths of something that doesn’t need to breathe. Without another word, Dean leaves his bowl behind, and heads out of the room.

 

*****

 

Mary knows it’s the last night she can spend here, so she’s going to spend it around the campfire with the rest of the group. Campfires aren’t a great idea, not here, and every time they set one up she swears she sees the dark hulking figures in the distance move closer. But she needs the company. 

“Got everything you need?” Bobby asks. He’s unofficial leader of this little pack.

Mary goes through a mental checklist. The guns. The angel blades. And her bag and its contents, maybe the most important thing of all. “I do. I’ll head out soon.” 

“Well, you’ve been good to have around. You know what you’re doing.”

“Does anyone?” Mary laughs, brief, like a knife thrown into a target. She kicks a spray of dirt into the fire. They pause in silence for a while. “Do you know why I’m going?”

“No,” Bobby says, “but I know there was a Mary Campbell who died twenty years ago. I saw her picture; she looked just like you. I remember that time a couple of dumb kids and their angel friend tumbled into this dimension from another one. I’m not gonna ask you any questions, but I can figure shit out.” He passes her a can of – something, which Mary turns down. No one here seems to eat, and the alcohol is nothing she’s used to and halfway deadly.

There’s a few more minutes of silence, until Mary says, “I could take you back with me. I mean, everyone here. Where I come from, it’s –” Mary thinks about how primal evil itself resurrected her, and all the crap she went through in the year before she landed in here. “I mean, it’s a war zone too. But in a different way.”

An enormous noise booms in the distance. Mary laughs again, a real one this time, and Bobby looks at her like he’s never heard the sound before. Probably hasn’t. It proves her point, anyway.

“Well, thanks for the offer,” Bobby says, after he’s taken a long swig from the can, “but I’m stickin’ around here. Crapsack world, but the only one I know. What I don’t know is how to act in a place where I can’t shoot a couple a’things a day for the fun of it. And sure as I belong here, you don’t. You’ve done a good job. But you – you got more to you than just killin’ baddies.”

Mary stares into the fire. She tells herself that the brightness, the smoke, it’s why her eyes are tearing up. “You have no idea how much I needed to hear that,” is all she says, eventually. 

She stays there with Bobby for a while, in silence, until the navy-black ash in the air starts to go hazy gray. That’s as light as it ever gets around here. One of the other hunters gets up and tosses sand on what’s left of the fire. She nods quietly at Mary, then hikes up her own pack on her shoulder and moves away. Bobby squeezes Mary’s shoulder, and trudges off with the group.

Mary takes a long look in the opposite direction. She thinks she can see a black speck on the horizon, but it’s probably just another rock formation. Time to go.

 

*****

 

Dean wrenches the door open and snaps on the light. Something that’s not Cas stares back at him.

Castiel – not Cas, this isn’t Cas, can’t ever be Cas – is tethered from his wrists all the way through his ankles. Silver chains criss-cross over his entire body, jangling loud whenever they move even a little. The chains are marked up with warding, and it must’ve taken a damn impressive set of eyes and skill alike and hours of painstaking work in order to make ‘em. Dean spends most of his time holding his breath when he hears them rattle.

Mom had been the one to chain him up like this. She could just barely look at the chains, nabbed from the British Men of Letters’ bunker before Sam and company had put it out of commission, so to speak. Dean hadn’t been able to look at Castiel at all. He’s gotten used to it by now. Only he really, really hasn’t. 

Castiel’s wings spread wide behind him, an enormous canopy that’s wider than Dean is tall. Deep black wings, glistening with green and purple undertones like an oil slick, gorgeous to an unbiased eye. Dean just finds himself wishing they were tattered wings instead. He looks at Castiel’s wings and sees black marks burnt into the sand. 

He can’t look at this Castiel’s wings for very long.

No one even knows Castiel’s here other than them. With the warding on his chains, he couldn’t leave the bunker if he wanted to. No angel business, no disappearing in the middle of the night. All Dean’s ever secretly and so fucking selfishly wanted out of Cas, really. But it ain’t Cas, and Dean can’t even pretend. 

He doesn’t like to think about that, so – “Mix tape helping you remember anything?” Dean starts. There are a couple of empty chairs in the room. He sits in one and spends a lot of time examining the floor. He doesn’t look at the familiar messy hair, the all-wrong ice-blue eyes. 

“I don’t know what a mix tape is.” Despite the same deep rumble reverberating in Dean’s bone marrow, Castiel’s voice is smooth as a brook wearing down the rocks on the river bottom. 

“Well, a mix tape is a way you listen to music in this… universe. You gotta make ‘em, put the songs on them yourself. Took me a couple hours to make.” 

Castiel shuffles in his seat and the chains clank. Dean’s stomach jolts. He needs this. He hates it. “That sounds interesting,” Castiel says, in a tone that indicates he thinks nothing of the sort.

“Yeah, well,” Dean continues. “You – well, not you, but the other you – Cas showed up for lunch one day.”

“Angels don’t need to eat. How different _is_ this world?”

“Can’t get anything past you.” Dean wants to throw a _buddy_ in there, but when he thinks of how often he used it for the Cas he knew, the word feels like a stone stuck behind his teeth. “But yeah, they don’t. I guess Cas just wanted someone to help him find Kelly.” 

When Cas was there, they hadn’t talked about Kelly at all over that lunch. It’s possible Cas had just wanted company, but he was never the type to crave that like Dean does. Dean’s the one who needs it so bad he’s here spilling all his secrets to a facsimile of his best friend. 

The lunch had been good, though. Dean made sandwiches, turkey and roast beef, in the kind of comfortable silence he’s had with no one in his life apart from Cas. There were some sliced jalapeños in a bowl nearby; without asking, Cas snatched a few of them up and shoveled them into his mouth. 

“I need those for nachos later,” Dean grumbled, because that was the only way he was touching any of Sam’s weirdo farmer’s market finds, but Cas ignored him and continued munching away.

“These actually taste like something, even to me. I can appreciate that.” 

“Okay, jalapeño popper,” Dean said, smiling. He watched Cas’ jaw work; Cas just watched Dean.

Eventually, he pushed the entire bowl of jalapeños in Cas’ direction. “If you’re gonna stick around, when you’re done with that, I have something for you –”

The Castiel in this reality now probably doesn’t know what a jalapeño even is. Dean keeps talking anyway. “I’d made Cas a mixtape. All Zepp. After this whole hunt where he told me – well, nevermind that. Point is, he needed a music education and God knows I wouldn’t trust Sam to teach that. He was listening to _Sufjan_ the other day – yeah, you have no idea who that is. It’s lame-ass music Sammy loves, is what it is.”

Dean had been ready to tease Sam for _years_ about liking that crap, and God knows they needed some levity. But then Sam had leveled him with a look, pointed his finger in Dean’s direction, and said, “You still know who he _is_ , Dean,” which was the most savage and terrible comeback he’d ever come up with. (It was true, though.)

Anyway. There’s a reason he’s telling Castiel this story, and it’s not because of the jalapeños or Sam’s awful taste in music. “I guess I wanted Cas to think of me when he was out there. He was gone, uh, kind of a lot.”

“And you thought about him.”

“I – worried.” 

The dull expression in Castiel’s eyes is extra unimpressed. “You worry about many things, Dean. Your immediate family. The people you consider your adopted family. The state of the world. And yes, the other Castiel. But it wasn’t just worry.” 

Most of their conversations go like this. “I think we’re done for the day,” Dean says, voice artificially steady. “I, uh, did bring this. Maybe it’ll jog your memory.” 

He drops his laptop on the table in front of Castiel. It lands too heavily on the surface, but who cares. Dean barely spends any time on the computer these days, and when he does, it’s to track the news outlets obsessively for some sign of weird shit involving a dude in a trenchcoat.

“Tape’s gone.” Dean never found the original. Too many times, his mind’s offered up the image of the tape tucked away neatly in Cas’ inside pocket, then splintering to bits on the business end of an angel blade. “But I got the music here.”

He only has to fiddle with the stupid audio player for a minute or two – Sam would be so proud – before “Immigrant Song” starts playing from the speakers. It’s a tinny sound, nothing like when it booms, forceful, out of Baby.

Dean doesn’t spare another look at Castiel. He leaves the room.

He made the tape for a lot of reasons. Mostly, though, he kept picturing Cas listening to it. Driving his stupid car, wind in his hair, squinting against the sun, finally hearing some music that kicked serious ass. Thinking of Dean while the song wrapped around Cas’ whole body and Robert Plant made ‘im sing. 

And yeah, Dean wanted to see what Cas’ reaction to “Lemon Song” was gonna be. Whether he’d get it, let himself _feel_ those dirty blues in his gut, and lower. Or his reaction to “Thank You.” “Whole Lotta Love.” 

He’ll never know now. Because Cas tried to give him the tape back, and bailed from the bunker to go find the nephilim kid, and then – and then – 

Then Dean ended up here. Where he trods down to the dungeon every day to talk to a creature from another universe that he can’t even look in the eye. Something that carries the name Castiel, but isn’t what Dean needs, or who he should have been telling this to all along. 

 

***** 

 

Michael’s been gone about a hundred years, Mary’s been told. Of course, when it happened, that didn’t bring an end to the constant war. Not even a truce. The angels just found a new leader, one of Michael’s favorites. If you believe most of the stories, she’s fiercer than he was with a blade. Smarter and more ruthless.

That’s who Mary’s hiking through the harshest parts of this world to find. 

The night hasn’t retreated for a week. If any stars exist here, Mary doesn’t know about it, because they’re all blotted out by the navy smog that belches into the sky. Yellow spotlights sweep across the dirt ahead of her, dust particles hazy in their wake. 

It’s the first real color she’s seen in years. She has to shield her eyes against it.

She keeps walking.

Mary didn’t grow up reading fairy tales – not with her parents. Maybe that’s why she can keep going, because this castle bristles with its _fuck you_ attitude to anyone too familiar with those stories; calling this place a castle seems like a mockery of the word. The palace is a hideous mass of spikes, crumbling to pieces but still nasty enough to promise a horrible death to anyone who gets too close. Grace oozes from the cracks, a slimy neon blue stream lighting up the building.

Mary could swear it shudders under its own horror.

The light from the grace doesn’t go out too far, but between that and the spotlights carving up the dry ground, Mary can see dozens of black wing prints stamped into the landscape. There are other angels guarding there too, trudging across their siblings’ remains without hesitation. 

On this dead plain, in the building sagging under its own ferocity, Mary sees a world of war. 

“You can’t get through to Heaven,” Jo Harvelle told Mary. Jo was one of the few hunters left at an outcrop Mary had stayed at before Bobby’s. Mary barely knew Jo, but her heart ached for her. She was barely thirty and nothing but hard edges already; her black eye didn’t fade in the few months Mary stayed there. 

“It’s just a castle,” Mary countered. She thought of the British Men of Letters bunker going up in flames, how she’d spent the better part of a year there but felt nothing but a grim relief when she’d heard about its destruction.

“You can’t get through to it.” Jo’s tone brooked absolutely no more argument. Mary changed the topic after that. She’d seen Jo’s stash of weapons and even more impressive cache of explosives, and if she said she couldn’t get through to Heaven, well, maybe no one could.

Didn’t mean Mary wasn’t gonna try. Campbells didn’t have much, but they had the clothes on their backs, knowledge of everything that went bump in the night, and all the stubbornness in this or any other universe. 

Mary tries to remember that as a couple of angels start moving in her direction. They walk slowly; they’re hulking and intimidating, weighed down by the massive spread of their wings behind them. They’re such a tightly-grouped morass here, all in the same dull clothing, that it’s hard to tell how many of them there are. Four or five, she figures.

Angels are brutal. But they’re lazy here, which would make her laugh if it wasn’t for such a terrifying reason. Namely that they always had the upper hand with their powers, so they could afford to be slow to attack. Which means she might as well try to get any advantage she can, as quickly as she can – 

“Don’t try it.” 

Mary hardly recognizes her own voice. Her heart may be racing, but her fists are steady. Those fists are currently adorned with knuckles that were once bronze, but are now stained with rust. The Enochian wards on them still glow a radiant neon, though, and that’s enough to make anyone on this side of the world listen to her. 

And if that doesn’t work, well, crazy Bobby Singer made her an angel bullet _bazooka_ , so she’s ready. She doesn’t like situations without backup.

Mary can’t look at angels in this universe for too long. Other than the fact that they’re almost always trying to _kill_ her, the way their wings curve up is unsettling, black slashes against the sky. The human ears ringing their necks sometimes leave a dripping trail of blood in their wake. Mary may know how to deal with them, but she still keeps her distance. 

She misses Cas. She thinks he’d understand it here, this place where nobody belongs. 

“I want to meet with Hannah,” she says, still holding her fists forward. She twists her waist as inconspicuously as she can, until the gun shines on her hip. Very little in this place has that kind of brightness, and nothing else is clean; she knows they’ll notice. “I have a deal to make.”

“Nice try,” one of the angels scoffs back at her. He’s wearing the body of a man ten or fifteen years younger than her boys. His face is almost soft, with blond hair and wide eyes to match. 

There’s something in his poise, though, that reminds her of the snobbiest jerks she had the displeasure of meeting from the British Men of Letters. It’s a damn miracle she doesn’t run away screaming at that. 

“A human demanding counsel with an angel is a crime,” the angel continues. His sword appears in his hand; even in the dim light here, far out from the castle, it gleams. 

That’s when Mary slugs him in the face. He goes tumbling to the ground and rolls over and over, his wings making the movement one hell of a bumpy ride.

When he finally comes to a stop, he looks up at Mary. He’s panting, _gasping_ , in what’s clearly disbelief. The impression from the runes is pressed into his cheek. 

She can’t take any time to gloat, not that it’s her style, because he’s back on his feet a few seconds after that and slicing through the air. His blade does make contact with her arm, but it only tears the sleeve of her jacket, and she needs to burn the damn thing anyway. 

There’s no time to get the gun ready, so Mary grabs her own sword. There’s another flicker of disbelief on the angel’s face.

She won’t stop. Not for this. Not for what she left behind.

They don’t bother to circle each other; they just make a crazed rush toward the center, where they meet in a flurry of limbs and awful metallic sounds as their swords clash. Normally, Mary knows, elbows to the face and hard kicks from a human won’t do shit to an angel, but she’s got the wards powering them down.

She can tell from the angel’s expression. He might still keep fighting, but his eyes have something wild and _different_ in them. He’s never fought sweaty and dirty like Mary has, never been in a brawl. He has never known fear, not the kind a human would ever bring him. 

He’s good. Even if he’s not used to this, angels aren’t warriors from the moment they come into existence for nothing. But Mary, she’s got motivation. The kind they’ll never understand, not here. 

“I’m sorry it had to come to this,” Mary whispers to the angel. “I wish you could have better, all of you.” There’s a moment when something flashes in his eyes. It could be confusion, it could be fury, or it could be one first and final moment of understanding. 

But that expression, it’s wiped clean when she stabs him hard through the heart and his eyes go blinding white.

The angel fighting her, he wasn’t Cas. To say the least. But she allows herself another free second to squeeze her eyes shut, because it’s still not easy to see again.

Second’s over. Mary strides forward, and puts one boot on top of the angel guard’s chest. Maybe it’s just bravado, the kind she needs, buoying her forward, but she could swear the other angels move backward almost imperceptibly. They could have stepped up to help their brethren, they could be charging her in revenge right now, but none of that is happening. She’ll allow herself hope if the adrenaline ever fades enough to let another feeling in. “As I said. I would like to meet with Hannah.” 

 

***** 

 

Cas wasn’t much like Jimmy Novak, sure, but Castiel’s his polar opposite. Whereas Jimmy was all easy smiles and smooth human moves, Castiel never smiles. When he does move, it’s unnatural, jerky, like a kid’s toy with the batteries running low. 

“I don’t think I liked the music,” Castiel tells Dean by way of greeting this morning. “It was loud and dissonant.”

“Ain’t you a barrel of fun.” 

“I am not a barrel and laughter was not permitted very often where I come from,” Castiel says, stiff as new jeans. Dean’s heart rate spikes; the words remind Dean of Cas, even if the tone is all wrong. 

With Cas, after a certain amount of time spent down on earth in the muck of humanity, Dean was never sure if he was serious or just fucking around. Castiel, though, he’s probably never made a joke in his – it seems wrong to call it a life. Existence. When he talks, he snarls out the words so hard the chains rattle.

Dean’s gotta change the subject. “Where’d you get the vessel?” Dean can’t help but ask.

Castiel glares at him in return. He doesn’t even get that little furrow between his eyes, the one that popped up on Cas’ face when he didn’t understand one of Dean’s references. Dean’ll deny it ‘til he’s gone, but sometimes he did it on purpose just to see that face. He thought a lot about smoothing out the lines on Cas’ face with his own hands, and seeing Cas’ rare gummy smile.

He’ll never get to do that.

Reality is a smack to the face. “Vessel?” Castiel bites, another awful reminder.

“Angels gotta have a vessel. Some poor sucker they occupy and then, when they’re done – I’ve seen what happens. Brain-dead and drooling, and that’s if they’re lucky. In your dimension, you guys’d probably love it.” 

Dean’s lucky he didn’t say _angel condom_. _That_ is definitely not a conversation he wants to have with the thing in front of him. 

Castiel offers a look down at his own body, as if for the first time. “I’m not occupying anyone,” he says.

“Only you in there?”

“Only me.” 

Dean lifts his eyebrows. “The Cas I knew, he had this guy named Jimmy Novak as his vessel. Didn’t know him too well, but nice guy. Liked burgers. His kid’s still out there, hunting if you can believe it, and she kicks all kinds of ass.” Castiel looks utterly unimpressed, and on Claire’s behalf, Dean half-wants to punch the guy. “Jimmy, though, he got blown up by an archangel within the year. He’s – been gone. Got a better life than most vessels.”

“That still sounds terrible,” Castiel says, flatly. 

“You wore teeth of the people you killed as a necklace,” Dean shoots back. There’s an ugly silence between the two of them for a couple of minutes; Dean doesn’t think he can leave the room on that note, but he doesn’t wanna keep talking either. He tugs words from himself anyway. “Why do you look like that, then? If you don’t know Jimmy.”

Castiel fixes him with a look that makes Dean want to shrink to his core. It _terrifies_ Dean, because it’s the same look _Cas_ gave him at first. Like standing in the middle of a tornado, letting it wreak destruction, while you welcome it in. 

“Some things may be the same from universe to universe,” Castiel intones. “I felt some kind of pull toward this shape. And other things. I wanted something of my own, and from the time of my creation all I’ve learned is that want is dangerous.”

Dean’s not sure what that’s implying. But he knows he doesn’t like it, doesn’t like what the words or Castiel’s tone do to his emotions. The tornado’s coming for him now, with no regard for what it’s leaving in its wake. 

“Good to know,” Dean manages to get out. “Good talk. See you – when I see you, if you feel like talking.” He can practically hear the acid in his voice, but it’s nothing but a half-assed attempt at building a wall he knows he can never fully put up. Cas – not even Cas, now, but whatever Castiel is – was too good at dismantling him, brick by brick. 

“I rarely do.”

“Don’t I know it.” 

The walk back to his room seems longer than usual. It doesn’t help that Dean runs into Sam in the hall. Sam looks at him all puppy-eager, then withdraws with an exaggerated frown when Dean just grunts at him.

Dean knows Sam hurts too. He knows he’s only trying to help. It’s just some days are better than others. 

When Dean gets back to his room, when he’s lying on his bed and listening to music, skipping all the songs that remind him of Cas – so maybe three-quarters of the songs, yeah – he remembers what he wanted to ask Castiel once he brought up the whole thing with similar appearances. He wanted to know if _feelings_ were the same from universe to universe.

He laughs, and it’s acrid. Here’s his opportunity; he could’ve finally be honest. And what he’s got is nothing like what he needs. 

Dean turns the music off. “Chuck?” he says to the darkness of his room. There’s nothing. 

So he tries something else. “Uh – Amara?” He could swear the light by his bedside flickers, but maybe it was his imagination. Maybe it was the dark space between blinks. “You brought me back my – you really did bring me what I needed. Thank you for that.” 

Not that it went well for Mary. Torn out of Heaven to end up here. She ended up in yet _another_ dimension because Dean couldn’t save her. And yeah, she made it out, but that’s because his mom’s awesome. Dean had nothing to do with it; all he did while she was gone was drink enough cheap liquor to fill the lake outside the cabin.

“I need – I gotta ask you for a favor. One more time. You gave him back to me too, you know, pulled Lucifer out of him. Cas, I – I need him back.”

Nothing happens. The light, if it flickered at all, stays on now, humming enough that Dean can hear it in the otherwise silence of his room. 

No one’s gonna save him. And no one can save Cas from Dean’s mistakes.

 

***** 

 

The throne doesn’t intimidate Mary. The wings might have at first, but no longer. What does make her heart rate tick up, though, is the necklace. It’s twisted what must be hundreds of times around Hannah’s neck, drooping almost to her knees. The ears studded to it hang limp; they brush the floor. 

Mary tries not to react. She’s pretty sure she fails miserably. At least she doesn’t puke.

“You’re either very brave or very stupid,” Hannah says in a soft monotone. “I haven’t seen one of your kind for many years, and it didn’t end well for them.” She offers Mary a twist of her mouth, not quite a smile. “It’s convenient when you have the power to pull apart a soul on a subatomic level. But go on. You’ve traveled a long time and shown more daring than most I know, even those under my control.” 

“Good to know,” Mary says. Her fingers, going white, clutch the brass knuckles. “I’m not here to chat. I have a plan.”

“A plan.” Hannah shifts, minutely. “Well, out with it.” 

“Maybe a plan was the wrong word. An exchange. I don’t know what you’ve heard about me –”

“I’ve heard you’re brutal.” Her eyes and wings flick in the direction of the long window in her throne room. The body of the angel that Mary fought, it’s still out there. “And then I saw it myself. As for whether that’s a good or a bad thing – I suppose it depends on your point of view.” 

“What’s your point of view?”

Hannah fixes her with a glare. It’s all frost, nothing like Cas, but the flash of angry blue pulls at Mary’s memories. “I can appreciate ruthlessness. But rarely in your kind.” 

Mary smiles, something hard and fake. The stretch hurts her lips. “There’s an exception for everything, right? Maybe this will help.”

Her knapsack is heavy and ugly and stinks like smoke like everything else in this universe, but it’s been carrying her key to getting out of this whole mess for – a couple of years now, must be. Time goes by too fast here. 

Pushing those thoughts out of her mind, Mary easily pops open the already-loose snaps on her knapsack, its shade of green gone a muddy brown with dirt and blood, and dumps two heads on the ground. 

_I killed you!_ Azazel had shouted, his face contorted in agony.

Lucifer had been different. _Come on,_ he’d said, a waver in his voice, raising both his hands in the air. He’d been afraid. God, if that didn’t satisfy her to her very core. _We’re – we’re really on our own here, might as well make the best of –_

He’d never finished his sentence. Mary could only hope that Sam, no matter how far away he might be now, felt it. And now, both Azazel and Lucifer’s unblinking faces stare up at Hannah on her throne. 

She hesitates for barely a second. It’s the amount of time only a hunter, desperately looking for some kind of weakness, could notice. “I’d heard Azazel was gone,” she says, “but I didn’t think it was one of _you_ who took him out. He’s given us a great deal of difficulty over the centuries. Angels that give themselves over to the forces of Hell know too much. My point is, for killing him, your kind of ruthlessness is the kind of human ruthlessness I could appreciate.”

“I hoped so.” Mary lets herself smile. 

“The imposter Lucifer is worthless to me –”

“We have that in common.”

Hannah doesn’t seem to get the joke, but she presses on. “Eliminating Azazel, though, that’s valuable. I assume you didn’t come here to gloat over it. So, Mary, what do you want?” 

“Just an exchange.” 

“Name it.”

Mary lets herself take one deep breath. She doesn’t even know if he’s here, and if he’s not, her whole plan’s gone to shit. But she has to try; she’s always going to try. “You get to claim credit. Me, I get one of your soldiers. I need the angel Castiel.” 

 

***** 

 

“Your Castiel,” Castiel says one day. Just two words make sweat bead on Dean’s hairline and threaten to trail down the back of his neck. He tells himself it’s the shitty air circulation down here. “How did you know him? You were obviously quite – close. That can’t be usual for a human and an angel, even if you aren’t in an apocalyptic war.”

Dean wants to snap back at him. But he has to look at it as an opportunity; Castiel doesn’t ask a lot of questions. He thinks about making up a story. But in the end, the best story he has is the truth. “Cas rescued me from Hell.”

Well, Castiel reacts to that one. The color drains from his face, and though he manages to fix his expression back into its usual inscrutable mask, shock remains in his eyes. “You went to Hell?” 

“Sure did. I don’t know what it’s like in your dimension, since Heaven’s different, but Hell ain’t exactly paradise over here.”

“Paradise is nothingness in my universe. It is arguably worse than Hell, depending on your point of view.” 

“You’re hilarious, let me tell you.” Dean sits down in the chair opposite Castiel. Looks right at him, but can’t focus on his eyes. His gaze strays – to his shoulder, the curve of his wing, the rough woven pattern on his robes. “But hilarity and all, I’m not sure you’re wrong. I ended up in solitary, max confinement. Couple of months ago.

“I told Sam it was worse than Hell. I – for me, it was true. Hell was Hell. I don’t like to talk about it. But what I remember was the pain. The fear. So much of it, until – until it was the only thing left. It was so easy to forget yourself. Solitary, though… I was alone. Only me in there. Nobody else. Just me and my thoughts and – so, every shitty memory of Hell, _and_ everything else I’ve ever done. I’ve, uh –”

“I know what you’ve done.”

This is the most Dean’s ever talked about prison. A lot more than he’s said about Hell in years. And he had to talk about it with Castiel.

Thing is, Cas had said that to Dean too, that he knew what Dean had done. He’d said it more than once. When they were together on the road during the apocalypse, and Dean was barely holding it together. After the Gadreel thing had blown up spectacularly in everyone’s faces. Once the Mark of Cain stopped crawling through his veins at last. Cas still had nothing but sympathy for Dean. Dean never deserved shit, but he reached for Cas anyway; he didn’t have the courage to turn away from his warmth.

Castiel, he’s cold. Hurried. Goddamn _bored_. He’s something from another universe that yawns off all the shit Dean’s done. 

Well, Dean can play nonchalant, too. “Real grab bag of fun, let me tell you.”

“What did you do to go to Hell? You have an incorruptible…” Castiel goes quiet. Dean realizes that he’s learning something like tact; the thought makes his jaw clench and presses his lips together. “You seem like a good man, as good as any man can be,” Castiel says, instead, his tone even stiffer than usual.

“Chill out with the compliments. No need to get so effusive.” Castiel’s brow crinkles, hard from his forehead, not like Cas. Dean presses on. “I went to Hell to save Sam. This douchebag demon was playing Hunger Games with a bunch of – God, they were really kids. Must’ve been ten years ago. Sam, he – he almost made it out.”

“Almost.” 

“Yeah,” Dean continues, voice lower now. “So I made a deal. My soul for Sam’s life. Tried to find a way out of it for a year, but –”

“The crossroads demons were eliminated before I came into creation,” Castiel says. “We wanted to remove all temptation. And they’re not very predictable or manageable.”

That was Crowley, alright. Dean imagines Crowley meeting this version of Castiel, then blinks it from his mind because it’s too horrifying to even imagine. Or maybe hilarious. “Anyway. I couldn’t get out of it. I went to Hell. And Cas, he… he saved me. He had orders from Heaven, and we never really talked about it, but – man, I’ve met plenty of angels since. Present company included. And I don’t think any other angel could’ve done it. It had to be Cas.”

“Why?” 

Dean knew the question was coming, but still, a long time passes after it. The silence bounces between them. Dean could ignore what Castiel just asked him. But if he owes Cas anything, it’s telling Castiel this. “The angels – they’re douchebags. Big Vulcan douchebags.”

“I don’t know what that –”

“They hate emotions. Stay away from ‘em and torture any other angel who feels them. But Cas, he – he wasn’t like that. Yeah, there was a _learning curve_ when he first came to bum it on earth. But more than any other angel, he felt things. That’s what life’s all about, even when it hurts. Even when it kills you. He got that.

“Maybe the angels were right. Emotions, they fucked up Cas’ entire existence. Might’ve broken him entirely. He’s – he’s gone because of them. But that was Cas. He felt ‘em. And if that’s what he was, I never wanted him to change.” 

Castiel scrutinizes Dean’s face, eyes sweeping across him too obviously. Dean feels like he’s run one of Sammy’s goddamn marathons. “Cas saved Sam, too, when he went to Hell a couple of years later. Fat lot of good my deal did.”

“Sam was in Hell too? And he’s here now? Your family really is remarkably resilient,” Castiel says. Despite his words, his tone isn’t impressed whatsoever. 

“We muddle through. We’re pretty cool zombies, man.” 

Dean gets to bed okay that night. Terrible as it was, that was one of his better conversations with Castiel. But the talk of Hell, it just reminds him of something that bubbles up in his dreams.

He’s standing at the crossroads. Again. It’s not cold out, but his whole body shakes. “C’mon,” he says into the night. “Come on.”

The night’s quiet. Dean only has so long. He told Sam he was going out to buy a six-pack, but they’re in the middle of nowhere, Kentucky. Sam’s not stupid, he must have known it was bullshit. 

He let Dean go anyway. They really have come pretty far. Too bad Sam’s trust is gonna blow up in his face.

If the demon ever shows up.

Dean knows he can’t handle Hell again, he knows it. Yet here he stands, throwing himself into the Pit for another go. 

“Come on!” Dean cries into the night. “Couple of years ago, you skanks woulda been knocking down the door to get a piece of this sweet ass! Where the hell are you now that I need you guys, huh?” 

No response. The night’s still quiet. Wind blows over the crossroads, kicking up dust, and the sound of it is as loud and jarring as gunfire. Something that might be a coyote looks at Dean from far in the distance; its eyes glow yellow against the black backdrop of the night and Dean’s stomach drops. It bounds off into the night, and Dean’s alone again. 

It’s been five weeks. The rest of Dean’s life, just like this, stretches out in front of him. And fuck it, he can’t do it. He’ll take one more year, one more goddamn _month_ , if it means he gets to spend it with Cas. Real Cas, not the simulacrum in the dungeon.

Looks like he’s not getting the choice. Nothing emerges from the night, offering tempting words and more tempting oblivion. 

Back in the bunker, Dean wakes up with his heart in his throat. He swears he hears the chains sighing every time Castiel moves downstairs. He rolls over a couple of times, punches the pillow, and gets absolutely no more sleep. 

 

***** 

 

The Castiel from this dimension has the face Mary is used to. That’s something, at least. Nothing else is even close to the same.

He’s wearing lumpy gray robes, wrapped around the entirety of his body. They must hinder movement, but Hannah had explained, blank-faced and flat-voiced, that he was extremely well-trained in combat, so Mary should be careful. It makes Mary sick to walk along with her gun trained on his back, but she’s done enough awful things out of necessity. 

At least he’s lacking the necklace of ears. Castiel apparently prefers teeth. Sometimes, the sound of them clacking against each other forces Mary to stop and throw up the lunch she didn’t even have. 

The Cas Mary knew, he had a glower that could probably raze cities on a bad day, but at least he reacted. Castiel, he just stares. He stares and he walks and he doesn’t talk. Hannah had leaned forward and pressed one dry kiss to Castiel’s forehead before she bound his hands tightly and shoved him off in Mary’s direction. Castiel hadn’t reacted at all. 

And, of course, there are the wings. Cas was so obviously vulnerable, emotional, so funny and charming sometimes, that it was easy to forget what exactly he was. But with Castiel, there’s no forgetting. His wings are huge and onyx black; they shimmer a dull green and purple that would probably be beautiful if this world had any color. A soft light glows around his head. All angel, all the way.

She presses on. Only a few days more until she gets to the portal, if she’s right. She hasn’t seen a soul – or something without a soul, always an option here – for weeks, other than Castiel. 

“Where are you taking me?” he asks, suddenly. Mary’s proud of herself for not jumping about a foot into the air. 

She considers not answering, but decides maybe she should try honesty from now on. Her façade got her what she was looking for, after all. “Can you tell I’m not – from here?”

“You’re a human, and you came to Heaven –”

Mary would tell the Cas she knew to _cut the oblivious angel shtick_ with a smile, because he’d sometimes fall back on it. But this is not the Cas she knew. His voice is still deep, but Cas always sounded so tired. Castiel’s voice is staccato, gunshots rattling through the silence. “I mean you know I’m not from _this universe_ , right?”

Another long silence follows; Mary wonders if the handful of words Castiel said are all she’s gonna get. Maybe he’s getting charged by the syllable. But after a while, he says, “I suspected.” There’s a dash of smugness in his voice. _He lives_ , Mary thinks.

“I’m taking you back to my own universe,” she says.

“Why? If you plan to kill me, I’d rather you get it over with now. I’m not interested in serving as a science experiment and I’m not for anyone to gawk at.” 

Mary swallows, and lets the stretch of desolate, smoking plains before her go blurry with unshed tears, before she speaks again. “The Castiel from my universe was a good friend,” she tells him. “He meant a lot to me and – and especially my sons. They really loved him.”

“But you’re human.” 

Mary fights the urge to roll her eyes. Not helpful. “Things are – different where I come from.”

“Your Castiel. Did his existence end in battle, at least?”

She grits her back teeth at his blunt phrasing. “He was taking on Lucifer.”

“You killed Lucifer.” For the first time, Castiel stares at her, really stares. Mary tries not to cower from the fierce blue of his eyes, the firm set of his mouth. “A human killed Lucifer while an angel could not?” 

“Watch it, bucko,” Mary returns. Castiel shoots her another look, one that tells her he’s got no idea what she’s talking about, but he turns around and keeps walking anyway. 

After a while, she speaks up again. “He beat Lucifer before,” she says. “Cas, he and my sons, they saved the whole world. But he – he’s gone now. Maybe you can help us get him back. Or help.”

“Neither of those is very likely,” Castiel says bluntly. 

Maybe Mary should let him go. There’s probably no good to be had of bringing a vicious warrior angel from one dimension to another just because he happens to bear a resemblance to the angel she’d considered like a son. All logic says this can’t end well.

But all logic said she’d never set foot on earth again. All logic said Sam and Dean and Cas could never beat the Devil and save the world. All logic said she would be stuck under Toni’s conditioning for the rest of her life, her mind lost in fake paradise while her body murdered family after family all the way across the United States.

The hunter part of her relies on logic. And it’s a good part of her, a strong part of her, a part of her she knows she’ll never get away from. But the part of her that keeps pushing Castiel forward – an outsider might mistake that for the hunter side of her, too, but it’s a different one entirely.

“You said he saved your world,” Castiel says a little while later, after what must be hours of silence. He says the words so haltingly; it reminds Mary of the first time she read an exorcism out loud, her tongue tripping over the Latin phrasing. “Is your world one worth saving?”

 

*****

 

“Your soul,” Castiel starts, the next day.

Dean’s body locks in place. He huffs to play it off. God, the way Castiel’s entire face wiped over in shock the first time he saw Dean. He’d choked out words in a voice weak with awe, like nothing Dean’s heard from Castiel since then. “We’re not gonna –”

“I won’t comment on it,” Castiel shoots back. “Much.” 

Or at all, apparently. The silence grows between them, the room’s third entity. When Dean raises his chin to stare Castiel in the eye, the angel stares right back. 

Dean hates comparing everything to Cas, but he can’t help it. Cas looked at him and it put lightning in his veins. Every glance they exchanged, every time they caught each other’s eye, it was that first desperate breath Dean gulped in his own coffin after his resurrection. 

Castiel looks at him and sorrow wells up through Dean’s entire body; he feels the shots he did the other night slosh around in his stomach. 

“I was only going to say,” Castiel speaks up at last, “that your soul is – it’s marked by the places you’ve been. I didn’t understand that until you told me you were in Hell. But I suspect you have been in Heaven, as well as other realms.”

“Purgatory,” Dean can’t help but say with a grim chuckle. “It’s where the souls of monsters go after they get ganked.”

“I don’t know if a place like that exists in my dimension. Monsters are very rare, possibly non-existent. They were annihilated by the war.” 

Only Castiel could make a world with no monsters sound like Mos Eisley Spaceport. “I was in Purgatory with Cas. For a year.” Dean would mention Benny, but he’s pretty sure Castiel would scorn the hell out of him for having a vampire friend. “It was violent, it was bloody. Made me think things about myself I never wanted to.” 

He tries to forget it, but he tortured. With nothing but his wits and brute force and a crappy jawbone weapon he rigged together himself, he put monsters on the run. He carved ‘em up, staining so much gray dirt black. It wasn’t Hell, though, he keeps telling himself. That’s the only thing that kept him sane, that he didn’t even feel a grim enjoyment from the whole thing. At least until the monsters started spilling where Cas was.

And none of it – the guilt, the nerves, the dread at his own damn self and what he could become in that place – compared to his terror at what his heart tapped out, beat by beat, through his body, every day: _you need him, you need him. You love him._

Castiel lets an eyebrow lift. “You say _violent and bloody_ like I don’t know what it’s like. Like I didn’t live through it for millennia. I’ve killed your kind.” 

“Yeah, Mom told me about the –” Dean makes a gesture around his neck. “At least it wasn’t ears. What else you wanna know about Purgatory?” 

“What was your Cas doing there with you? It can’t be a place where angels belong.”

“Long goddamn story,” Dean snaps, “but you’re right. He didn’t belong there. He was like a beacon in there. Every baddie in the place was after his ass. You know, he bailed on me when we first got there, and when he admitted that, God, I was so pissed. Turns out it was all to keep those guys away from me. Keep me safe.

“He did that a lot. Protecting me, Sammy, Mom, our friends. Even his crappy family, those of them that mattered to him. That’s how he – that’s why he –”

“Is that why Lucifer murdered him?” Castiel interrupts. 

Dean turns around and clenches his fists. He lets himself breathe until enough of the fury’s ebbed out of his body. Castiel’s still wearing the same perfectly placid expression on his face once Dean can face him again. “Yeah,” Dean says. 

“You don’t want to talk about it,” Castiel says. “I understand.” 

“Ten points to Gryffindor.” Dean’s voice is diminished, chopped up at the roots. “Don’t let Sammy know I said that.”

“I won’t, I rarely talk to him. I’m still interested in hearing about Purgatory, though.” The glint in Castiel’s eyes is too sharp. 

“World of baddies and brutality and blood,” Dean manages to say. “You woulda loved it. That kind of place, it’s – in a way, it’s simpler.” 

Dean had called it _pure_ when Sam asked. He’d always wondered if Purgatory was the one place where he was really himself. A torturer, a murderer, judge and jury and executioner, the thing even the bad guys told stories about around the campfire. A creature from another world that glowed irresistibly in the night, letting nothing but his heart propel him forward in every step. Someone too human, too vulnerable, too sentimental. All of it was him. 

Purgatory felt pure, it felt simple, because it was the place where he was only his emotions. No complications, no obligations. It was just instinct and reaction and _want_.

“Things in this universe,” Castiel says, interrupting his thoughts, “they’re far more complicated.”

“You don’t have to tell me that.” Dean pushes himself up and out of his chair, and leaves the room. He wishes he could leave his feelings like that too, held down by chains, in the dark and the quiet where only he’d have to deal with them.

 

***** 

 

Mary steps out to her world again. Salt stings her nostrils, the first thing she’s smelled other than ash and choking blood in years. Birds are singing; the sky is blue. Everything feels fake.

Until she looks down and the toe of her boot nudges a sharp black mark on the ground. Her stomach swoops, a one-two punch of fury and a deep, deep sadness, and it’s real again. 

There was a time, not long ago, when Mary would have wanted to stay in the other universe. Ketch was right; she’s a killer. No one who isn’t could survive there. The world was hunting distilled, the terror and thrill of it alike, and that’s the only thing she’s ever really been good at. If she went out a bloody mess, God knows she played fast and loose with her own life enough before that.

She squeezes her eyes shut. Thoughts like that are why she didn’t stay there. Ketch was right, but Mary hopes against hope that Dean and Sam, they might be right too. 

“Is this your dimension?” Castiel asks. His eyes are focused on the wing marks. They’re barely smudged, so it couldn’t have been that long that Mary’s been away. God, she hopes.

“It is. It’s home.” Mary exhales, inhales. She pushes the apocalypse world out, and welcomes the world she knows back in. 

She takes in the shack, with the forest and enormous blue-capped mountains across the lake. In the other world, the land was buzzed flat – at least, where it wasn’t a dangerous rocky cliff that would slash you into gory ribbons before you died from the fall. Trees were pathetic, twisted and bare things more like sticks stuck in the ground than trees. The only color she saw was in the sickly yellow spotlights the angels used. 

One little insignificant deal, and she made her world what it is. Two – three – wonderful boys, they kept it that way. She rubs the back of her hand against her eyes, but the tears still spill out.

She’s about to say something to Castiel, when Sam comes rushing out of the house, gun drawn. He’s yelling, something Mary can’t make out, but she’s already holding out her arms to him.

The hug’s her first sign of human kindness in what might have been a decade. It’s the first time she’s talked to another human for something other than stomach-churning war intel in years. Mary breathes into it, letting it settle into her bones. Kindness, warmth, family. Humanity. Such things do still exist.

At least her face is already wet from the tears when Sam splashes her across it with holy water. “Would expect nothing less,” she gasps. She can’t even bring herself to wipe the water off, instead letting it drip onto the ground. “How long has it –”

“Only a couple of days.” His voice, though, God. It might as well have really been decades. He laughs bitterly. “Jack’s gone. I was looking non-stop, but there was nothing about you anywhere. And Dean, he’s, uh.” Sam’s voice drops so low that Mary has to strain to hear it. “I don’t know how he is. Not good.”

Not that she could really forget, but the mention of Dean makes Mary remember what she’s brought back with her. She tugs her captive forward. “Not my best idea, I know, but I have –”

Sam furrows his brow for a couple of seconds, clearly unsure. But then Castiel lifts his head up, so his face is visible outside of the robes. The confusion is gone in a second, as Sam’s eyes go enormous as the full moon. 

“Mom, you didn’t –”

“I had to.” 

Sam’s protests fall silent after that. He hazards another look at Castiel and gives him a cautious nod; Castiel doesn’t return it, of course. Their strange crew, Mary and Sam and their captive from another universe, they start walking to the house together.

“Where is –” Mary cringes. She doesn’t want to say what she has to. “Where’s Cas? Did you – I know he was an angel, but I hope you gave him a hunter’s funeral. I didn’t know him like you did, but he – he deserved that. Kelly too.”

Sam’s lips purse, unnaturally flat. “They’re both gone, Mom.” Mary moves to put a hand on his shoulder for comfort, but Sam continues before she can touch him. “I mean – they’re really _gone_. We don’t know where they are, or what happened to them. Jack, too, but, uh. We’re not so focused on Jack right now.” 

The hunter part of Mary, the side of her that Toni’s serum dragged gleefully to the surface and let poison her veins like an oil spill, rears its head in fury. There’s a dangerous creature out there, and the two people in the world with the best chance of stopping it are doing nothing. 

Thank God, she’s able to ignore it now. She flushes it out of her system, wraps an arm around her younger son, and staggers with him into the house. 

Dean’s waiting there. 

Sam looked horrible when Mary first saw him, cheeks gaunt and dark circles smeared under his eyes. But the look on Dean’s face is a look a mother never wants to see on her child. 

When Dean was a toddler, couldn’t have been much more than two, he’d stumbled while walking and sliced his knee open on a jagged rock. He couldn’t stop screaming and screaming and screaming, and Mary swore she’d never let him hurt like that again. Guilt radiates out from her gut when she thinks about just how badly she’d failed him there. 

Here and now, the look on Dean’s face, it’s a pain like that. Only there’s no wailing now. He simply gets up and starts walking out of the room. 

“Your soul,” Castiel says.

Dean freezes at those two words.

This version of Castiel carries himself ramrod straight, boxed in by some invisible boundary. His body’s looser now, almost slumped, but it’s not defeat in his stance, it’s awe. Something bright and sharp and uncertain has reached his eyes. 

Mary’s never seen uncertainty from this Castiel before.

Dean stands at the doorway. He looks sick, pale in the face and miserable. He looks like hope, poured down into one human, enough to make his hands shake and his eyes go shiny with it. 

Castiel speaks up again. “I – how do I know you? I can’t know you, but –”

The tentative moment shatters as Castiel’s voice trails off. Dean barks a laugh with absolutely no humor behind it, and finishes storming out of the room. The door slams so heavily behind him that the entire cabin rattles. 

Sam turns back toward Mary. There’s a weight to his brows and stress lines etched deeply on the sides of his mouth. “How has he –”

“Not real great,” Sam answers. “He’s not talking much – yeah, he’s not talking at all. He’s barely eaten anything. Getting his calories the liquid way. At least he’s stayed here, not gone out and crashed the Impala or – worse.” 

Mary remembers Dean’s words to her in her own mind. _I have made deals to save the ones I love. More than once._ Their whole family’s lousy with deals. A sour taste bubbles up behind her tongue. 

Sam’s words bring her out of her own mind. “How long was it for you?” 

“In the other universe? Years. Maybe decades.”

“Fighting Lucifer?”

Mary twists her fingers together and lets something like a smile spread over her face, even if there’s little happiness behind it. “No. I killed him.”

Sam’s mouth actually falls open, eyes wide and wild, but before he can say anything, Dean’s back in the room. He has a duffel bag hoisted over one shoulder, but the heft that’s clearly weighing him down is more than just a bag. 

“I wanna get back to the bunker,” Dean says. His voice is thick; unshed tears and lack of use, Mary would guess, and the thought of that clutches at her something awful. “Maybe start to find something on where Jack went.” He pauses, scrubs a hand over his face. When he moves his palm, Mary takes in how red his eyes are, how stark his dark stubble looks against his cheeks. “If you wanna bring – that – with you…” Dean isn’t looking at Mary, Sam, or Castiel. He’s looking out the window of the kitchen, so he can see the little beach. “Do what you want. It’s okay.” 

He’s out of the room, at that. The Impala rumbles in the distance, its metallic roar antithetical to this charming little cabin, the reeds rustling on the banks of the river, the salt tangy in the air. But the world of that car, it’s the only life she’s known and the only one where she can maybe reach Dean.

“Let’s get the fuck out of here,” Mary says, at last. Sam ducks his head, probably flustered at his mom cursing. Castiel doesn’t respond at all, but goes with her when she pulls him, a little too hard, out of the room.

She makes a point of not looking down when they walk over the beach. She doesn’t see the black char of wings spread wide again. She can pretend they’re not there. That there’s hope.

 

***** 

 

“This is going to embarrass you, so apologies –”

“Hey, man, you’re getting better at this manners thing. Congrats. Not that I’m much of a role model there –”

“–but I can hear you praying.”

That stops Dean up short. He should stop talking, because Castiel had no right, no goddamn right, to hear those prayers. But Dean’s options are draining away by the day. “Kept me sane in Purgatory. I gotta try everything, right? Talkin’ to you ain’t doing much so far.” He tries to keep it light. Play it off like it’s no big deal. His voice only wobbles a fraction.

Castiel leans forward as best as he can with the chains holding him back. The feathers on his wings flick up as if offended. “I said I can _hear_ the prayers. I know what you’re saying. You’re not doing it because it’s convenient.” 

Most of the hunter community talked a big game, but once they found out Dean was best friends with an angel, they were usually cool with it. _He’s gotta be useful,_ they’d point out over cheap beer and salted nuts, and Dean would generally agree and move the conversation along. At the lowest moments of his friendship with Cas, Dean would wonder if that was why the two of them kept coming back to each other. Maybe he _was_ just using Cas; maybe, to Cas, Dean was nothing more than the one mission he never completed. 

But Dean knows that’s bullshit. He needed _Cas_. He needed bullshit nights spent in comfortable silence watching _Dr. Sexy_ and those harrowing conversations that ate them both up inside alike. Through it all, it was Cas. 

“No, not the convenience,” Dean spits back in Castiel’s face. “It wasn’t ever that.” 

“I don’t know you, Dean,” Castiel says in return. Under-fuckin’-statement. “But from what I do know, you are highly skeptical of angels. You can’t stand me, and I’m as close to your _friend_ as anyone could be. Why pray to the other Castiel? I don’t understand why you care so much.”

There are – a lot of reasons. Dean manages to come up with, “Caring makes you human. Something you wouldn’t know anything about. Cas, he, uh. He cared a lot more than anyone I’ve ever met. Put his ass on the line because he cared so much.” His fingers tap the table. He wishes he had a napkin to tear up, or something. “Cared so much he almost fucked up the world pretty bad one time, but you know what, he came through, he fixed it.” 

“But he wasn’t human.”

“He was, uh, in a state of flux a lot of the time.” Dean chews on his lip. “My fault, mostly. But the prayers, I don’t know how much they worked. He heard ‘em in Purgatory, but the past year, Sam and I got taken in by the feds. When I was in solitary – remember that? – I prayed to him for weeks, and nothing. But I kept praying.”

“You keep praying.”

“I met God,” Dean tells Castiel, by way of an answer. “I met God, and I told him he sucked right to his face. Screw him. The other angels – you know what I think about them. Cas is the only one of them, any of them, that I _ever_ had faith in.”

There’s silence for a long time after that. Dean’s thinking he might as well leave. If he has anything to say to Castiel, the guy can apparently hear his prayers, so maybe he’ll add in some choice goddamn words for him tonight.

That’s when Castiel speaks up. “I’m never sure what you’re talking about,” he says, “but I wish I had that kind of faith. In anything.” 

“There was this woman, on a case – God, must have been fifteen years ago.” The Layla Rourke Memorial Fund, modest as it is, donates all proceeds to pediatric cancer research; Dean looked it up a few months after the case. Every year, he stuffs a five dollar bill in an envelope with no return address and sends it to the fund. “She told me once that you couldn’t just have faith in the good times. You had to have it when the miracles didn’t happen, too. Now, I ain’t an optimist, and neither are you. But maybe you should keep it in mind.” 

“Do you still believe in your Castiel?”

Dean laughs. There are tears in his eyes, threatening to spill, but God help him, he laughs. “Yeah. I couldn’t stop if I tried.”

 

***** 

 

They’ve been back in the bunker a couple of days. Sam’s got no idea what to do. They got their mom back, and Lucifer’s dead and gone along with the British Men of Letters. He Skypes with Eileen regularly, and he might hate phone calls, but seeing her face on the screen makes everything seem a lot better – at least, until he has to hang up.

Things should be happy, or at least happier. They should relax. But they’re not, and they don’t. Most days, the bunker is as quiet as a tomb. And Sam knows exactly why.

They figured out what to do with Castiel early on. In one of her bags, Mary had some chains that could hold down an angel, even at full power. “I stole them,” she told Sam and Dean, grimacing even as she did. Neither of them bothered to ask where she stole them from, because they knew.

They stashed Castiel in a basement dungeon. Not the same one where they’d kept Crowley, Dean had insisted, before turning and walking right out. Mary stared at the open door for a long time, like if she looked out at the hallway long enough, it’d give her the magic words to peel the sadness away from Dean – but in the end, she turned away from the doorway to draw a complex sigil on the wall. Something even Sam had never seen before.

“It’ll power down an angel,” she explained, “in case of emergency.” She wouldn’t look at Sam as she said it, but stayed focused on the sigil’s spikes and loops.

Castiel was eerily quiet. He turned his head and, unblinking, watched Mary draw the sigil. He’d barely said anything to any of them, and it was giving Sam the friggin’ creeps. Days after Mary chained Castiel up, Sam kept bolting awake in the middle of the night expecting to see Castiel waiting for him in the doorway to his room. Staring at him in his sleep. Perched on his bed. 

“You think it’ll work on, uh, an angel from another dimension?” Sam asked.

“Better than anything else we have,” Mary said, her tone gray. 

So yeah, those words are now Sam’s motto. A good hunter’s motto, he thinks at the grimmest times. He mutters it to himself every time he goes into Castiel’s basement room, to ask him questions to which he’ll get no answer. 

Whether Sam’s motto is true or not, it doesn’t change the fact that Castiel isn’t Cas, his friend. His brother, even. As much family as Sam ever had, and gone now.

Sam’s headed upstairs after another disastrous Q-and-A, or rather Q-and-Q-and-Q-and-Q-with-no-goddamn-As-at-all, session. That’s when he hears it, from the direction of their rooms. The noise is a heavy, solid whack, with little wisps of softer sound if Sam strains to hear them. It sounds like _chopping_. 

Truth be told, Sam really really really does not want to know. But he’s also sometimes – frequently – really really really _super fucking worried_ about his brother. 

“Dean?” he asks, standing by Dean’s bedroom door. He’s learned by now not to barge in, though he can’t imagine what kind of debauchery Dean would even be up to with the mood he’s in lately.

There’s an affirmative grunt. Sam steps in, and – he certainly wasn’t expecting what he sees. 

He doesn’t even recognize what it is, or rather was, until he catches a glimpse of the markings carved into what’s left of the shaft, and sees the silver tip next to Dean on the blanket. Michael’s Lance. Dean’s destroying it. 

“Heya, Sammy,” Dean grunts out, not looking up.

Sam’s about a quarter of the way to saying something like, _That won’t bring him back,_ before he decides (much, much) better of it. “I’d ask how you’re holding up, but…” he says instead. It’s probably not much better.

Dean doesn’t say anything for a while. He just keeps _ripping_ at the wood; the pieces scatter all over the otherwise pristine floor. “Just got tired of these two douchebags ruining our lives,” he grunts at last. “Michael’s gone rogue in the Cage, Lucifer’s _dead_ in _another dimension_ and still –”

“It sucks. I know.”

At that, Dean looks up for the first time since Sam came into the room. “I was expecting – you know –”

“A chick flick moment?” Sam dares to let the corners of his lips quirk up.

“Nah, you know I like those.” He returns the hint of a smile. “Not a response like that, I guess. A lecture. Or you tellin’ me everything’s gonna be okay. It’s… not. Or it’s gonna be a while before it is. Maybe never.” 

“Have you –”

Dean drops the machete. It clatters to the floor, setting off a tiny puff of wood chips in its wake. “I know what you’re gonna ask,” he says, when it’s quiet again. “And no. I haven’t gone to see him.” He scrubs a hand over his face. “How about you and Mom? You guys chattin’ it up with him? Made any, uh, progress?”

“Hardly,” Sam says with a snort. “I know Cas sounded like a televangelist when we first met him, but at least he talked. This guy, he’s like alternative Cas or something.” 

“ _Alternative Cas_? Thanks, Kellyanne Winchester.”

Sam blinks. “Dean, out of all the crap we’ve been through, that is absolutely the worst thing you’ve ever said to me.” 

Sam’s actually chuckling at that. Dean _made a joke_. He hasn’t done that since the night – the night Jack was born, Sam thinks, very firmly. The humor’s gone.

“It’s up to you,” Sam pushes on. “I don’t wanna make you do anything, and – it’s awkward, I get it.”

“You –” 

“What?”

Dean hacks another long splinter off the lance. “Never mind,” he hisses. 

Sam continues, brightly as he can. Which isn’t much. A half-watt bulb at most. “Maybe this can help, I don’t know. It’s a long shot. But we’ve beaten the odds before.”

“There’s the friggin’ pep talk,” Dean groans, but he goes quiet after that. Collects all the pieces of wood strewn across the floor, and throws them in the trash while tossing a defiant expression in Sam’s direction.

It’s not a win, but it’s not a loss either. It’s better than anything else Sam has. After the few weeks they’ve had, he’ll take it.

He’s eating breakfast the next morning when Dean comes to the kitchen. When he pours himself a glass of orange juice, he picks up the vodka to drop that in, too, like he’s been doing the past couple of weeks. But he seems to think better of it, and puts the bottle back down very firmly. 

“Alright,” he says at last, after a few long swigs of the plain OJ. “I’m game. Take me to meet Olivia Dunham down there already.”

It’s a quiet walk downstairs. Sam wishes he could say something, the perfect words, but he’s never been good at that no matter how hard he tries. All he can think to do is gesture widely once they reach the door. 

“I’ll be outside,” he says, clapping a hand on Dean’s shoulder. Judging by the look on Dean’s face, that’s what he was looking for: not the perfect words, just Sam’s support. With a nod, Sam steps back, leaving Dean to walk inside the room.

For a couple of beats, there’s only the empty sound of footsteps echoing, then silence tense enough that the air might as well vibrate. That’s when Dean speaks up, his voice an axe to the base of a tree. “Do you know anything about me other than my – my soul? The Cas who came from this dimension, can you help me get him back?” His voice is tense as a stretched wire. 

Sam’s both shocked and not at all surprised to hear Castiel actually respond to Dean. “No and no.”

“If we found some way to find him, would you help?”

“I don’t know.”

“Good start,” Dean says, voice tight.

It’s not a good start, Sam thinks. But it is _a_ start. It’s better than anything else they have. Dean leaves the basement room only ten minutes later; muttering sharply to himself, he ignores Sam to storm back upstairs. 

He’s back the next day, though, and the next and the next. 

Dean talks. They wait. They all hope. 

 

***** 

 

With the kind of life he leads, sometimes it’s a good thing Dean doesn’t sleep so well. It’s saved him from being a real sweet cut of filet mignon for some monster more times than he can count. When he finds his eyes snapping open tonight, though, it ain’t because of the imminent danger. 

In his nightmares, Dean hears chains all the time. Hell’s chains, old rusty things that cut you right the fuck up when they brushed against you. They heaved and wheezed and pulled tighter against whatever passed for skin in Hell. Those nightmares are some of the worst; Dean wakes up with a phantom ache, even if Alastair and Lilith and the other demons that turned Dean into their personal chew toy don’t show up. 

There are chains rattling now, but these are different ones. These are clean and new, Dean can tell just from the sound. Sterile, really, in typical fussy-ass British Men of Letters fashion. Dean sees them in his mind’s eye, pulled tight over and looping carefully under Castiel’s elaborate robes. 

Dean bolts straight up in bed. _Castiel_.

He rushes down to the dungeon in the basement. His lungs are aflame and every thought is gone from his head. When he gets there, though, he’s not at all surprised by what he finds. Most of the chains are spread out over the floor by now, their silver glinting like a rushing river in the darkness. 

Castiel probably knows he’s coming, but Dean flicks on the light anyway. Sure enough, Dean gets blasted with a glare of blue fire and fury the second the lights click on. Most of the chains are off Castiel, though a couple of them still cross over his body. One handcuff is tight around his wrist. Good. Makes it a fair fight. Maybe. 

Then again, powerful angel from another universe in the middle of an escape plan. Maybe it’s better if he starts with diplomacy. 

“I knew it,” Dean says. His voice is halfway between a laugh dripping battery acid and a sigh. He can’t even be angry; he knows what isolation like this is like. Worst thing about the Mark was how it boxed him up inside his own mind. He was willing to get tossed into the Empty just to get out of solitary. After all that, he still put Castiel in a cell, chained him up and closed the door behind him. “I get it, man. Of everyone out there, I do. But you can’t do this. You just can’t.” 

In an instant, Castiel is practically pressed to his chest. His remaining chains push hard enough at Dean that they’re going to leave indents in his skin. Dean hates that his heart rate ticks up at the proximity. “You do not _get it_ ,” Castiel snarls. “Don’t tell me you understand.”

Rage rattles off him. Dean’s surprised he hasn’t been turned into smoking ash already. He thinks he hears footsteps behind him, voices outside the door, but until then –

He slams his hand on the wall, activating the angel depowering symbol. Another little trick they picked up from the British Men of Letters. What those guys could have done to Cas sometimes rattles Dean to the bone, but of course, in the end, it didn’t fucking matter. 

Dean always did worse to him anyway.

The elaborate cursive flares blue, and Castiel doubles over. With his free hand, he clutches at one ear, while blood trickles down from the other one. It blossoms red over his robes once it’s slithered down that far. 

Castiel howls. He gasps at the air, a fish out of water. The noises wrench Dean’s gut in agony. He hates this. He _hates_ this – 

Sam rushes into the room, eyes going wide at the sight before him, only a beat or two before Dean’s thoughts devour him completely. “What the hell!”

Jarred by the interruption, Dean jerks his hand away from the sigil. Castiel collapses to the floor, heavy like when Dean dumps artillery shells on the table to clean ‘em out. His hand is still limp in the grip of the handcuff. 

Dean drops his shoulder and scoops his arms around Castiel. He tries to pull him up off the floor. Unsurprisingly, Castiel doesn’t budge. The guy practically claws at Dean’s arms. Dean isn’t sure if he’s trying to push him away or pull him closer, and he’s doubly not sure which option would be worse.

Castiel is cold to the touch. Dean clenches his jaw. His teeth hurt, they’re ground together so tight.

Mary walks in, face going pale. “What happened?” she asks. 

“Castiel here tried to make a run for it,” Dean says. He claps his free hand over Castiel’s shoulder, but pulls it away almost as quickly as he put it there. “Gotta wake up pretty early to pull one over on the Winchesters.” The humor doesn’t reach his voice; he’s not surprised. 

“It was 3:38 AM when you walked in,” Castiel huffs out. “I know that’s considered early –”

“More like late.” Dean’s stomach might boil over. 

“Why do you even talk to me?” Castiel asks. Dean’s taken aback by the irritation in his voice. “You clearly don’t like me at all.”

“I like you more now for showing an attitude,” Dean volleys back. “I wish I knew, man. Closure? Not like I’m ever getting that.” 

“Catharsis,” Castiel counters. “Confessions.”

The words hit home like darts. Like an angel blade through the heart, fuck. All Dean can do is stare for a few beats. “You don’t know who the hell I am,” he hisses. 

Castiel glowers from his position on the ground, chest lifted halfway up off the floor but his legs firmly stuck there. He may be chained to the floor, his wings held down thoroughly, but there’s a gauzy, heady wave of power surrounding him now. Dean tries to stay steady, but his head swims with it. 

“And you don’t know me,” Castiel intones. “I mean nothing to you. You are using me because you didn’t have the courage to talk to your friend that you _loved_. And now you’ve lost him.” 

Dean’s out the door before he can even process what Castiel said. He knows Sam and Mom call after him, but he doesn’t care, and they don’t follow him. He’s so tired, and even with the people he’s closest to in the entire world in the room with him, he’s so fucking alone. 

He gets up the stairs. He’s not sure how. He only knows that, next thing he’s aware of, he’s in his room and collapsing onto his bed. He lets the memory foam take in his shape and wishes it’d swallow him up completely.

Whatever the hell happens the rest of the night, he sleeps through it.


	2. Chapter 2

“She’s really good at what she does,” Jody had promised, pressing the card into Mary’s hand. “Was only in the life for a couple of years, but she got out to, well, do this.”

“Thanks.” Mary let herself stare at the business card. Growing up the way she did, with her dad – she would have never considered it. But, well, it’s been a weird year since she came back. Decades, if you count her time in the other universe. Amazing and awful in equal measure, sometimes.

Jody smiles. “No judgement from her, I promise. She really gets it.” She wraps Mary up in a hug. Mary feels sort of bad that she only hugs back with one arm, but she lets herself accept the comfort. When it sweeps through her, she thinks that she could get used to it.

That’s how Mary finds herself in the waiting room to talk to a shrink. A _hunter_ shrink. Dr. Zoe Chen’s business card wouldn’t have looked out of the ordinary to anyone who didn’t know, but the embossed anti-possession symbol stamped into the corner gave her away to those in the life.

Mary doesn’t want to think about why she’s here until she’s in the room with Dr. Chen, so she studies the other people in the waiting area. There’s a lot of plaid flannel and even more thousand-yard stares. Her heart clenches hard.

Alex Jones waits in one of the chairs. Mary must react in surprise; when Alex notices her, she gives a tiny wave, then moves into the empty seat next to her.

“We didn’t have the best introduction,” Mary says. She doesn’t cringe; she holds eye contact. Everything turned out fine, she keeps telling herself. Better than fine. But she still feels awful about it. Desperately needing to process her feelings on all of that is a big part of why she’s here, anyway. “Mary Winchester.”

With a big smile and none of Mary’s awkwardness, Alex takes her outstretched hand and shakes it. “Alex Jones. Did Jody put you up to this?”

Mary tries to keep her laugh low enough that the other people can’t hear it. “You bet. Does she come here, too?”

“When she can. Kind of busy, you know?” Even behind Alex’s smile, her eyes are incredibly sad. Mary isn’t surprised. Not like it’s rare in this line of living. “She’s the most amazing person I’ve ever met. I owe her so much, but – it can’t be easy for her.” Alex swings her legs back and forth, keeping her eyes tightly focused on her knees now. “I don’t know how much you know. Probably not fair for me to talk about it.”

“I know enough.” What Mary went through the past year, maybe no one can understand. But Jody lost her husband, her kid. Worse: she lost her kid, got him back, then lost him again. Every day Mary’s alive, John’s absence feels like a phantom limb, but the idea of losing Sam or Dean was enough to make her jam a gun against her temple and ready her finger at the trigger. “But you probably know more about me. When we met – that’s a big part of why I’m here. And I’m sorry for that. It’s – not to say it’s right. It isn’t. But every hunter knows everything about everyone, seems like.”

Alex’s eyes are still on her feet, but she says, “I’m not much for the life, but hunters are like a really juicy school dance with way more messed-up trauma,” and laughs. “I mean, zombies? Ghosts?”

“We’ve got literal demons!” Mary adds, the two of them laughing. “Werewolves, vampires…”

All of a sudden, Alex goes quiet, and looks away again, very pointedly. Her breathing’s almost staccato.

Mary swallows. “Shit. I’m sorry. I didn’t know, Alex. And I’m sorry for saying _shit_ too, I guess.”

When Alex turns toward her, she has a smile on her face. It’s a small and wary one, but it’s there nevertheless. “ _That’s_ not an issue. I mean, you _know_ Jody and Claire, right?” Her smile fades a little, that same sad look in her eyes. “The vamp thing – I have history. And I don’t wanna talk about it right now. But maybe some day. And then… I love Jody, Claire’s my sister, but I want to get out of this life.” She brightens up by a couple of degrees. “That’s why I’m here, anyway.”

Mary reaches over and squeezes her knee for comfort. Alex accepts it, at least. “As good a reason as any, Alex.”

Dr. Chen comes out of her office. She’s short and chubby, with a round face that’s instantly welcoming. With some amusement, Mary notices that even she is wearing a red plaid button-up. Hunter habits die hard. “Mary Winchester?” she calls out.

“Guess that’s my cue,” Mary tells Alex, pushing out of her chair and walking toward the open door.

She’s almost there when Alex calls out for her. Mary turns back around to find Alex fixing her with a dazzling grin. That alone is enough to raise her spirits. “Things are gonna be okay, I think.”

Mary should disagree. Alex might know all the gossip, but she didn’t tell her about the warrior angel from an alternate apocalyptic universe chained up in her basement. Or the way Dean wears his broken heart both on his sleeve and all over his face. Or how Sam so desperately tries to hold it together for not just her and Dean, but what seems like every hunter. And she might never know the full story, but it’s hard for Mary to forget the look on Alex’s face at just the mention of vampires.

But instead, she smiles. “I hope so. I think so,” she says, before following Dr. Chen into the room.

 

 

*****

 

These past couple of years, Dean’s been drinking like your average hunter. That ain’t healthy, and he knows it, but at least it’s not the way he used to be, when he clung to booze like the only lifeline he had. The year with the Leviathans, and Sam seeing Lucifer everywhere, and Cas gone and then crazy, and Bobby gone and then _going_ crazy – that year was the worst. Not like he’s been sober since then, but he usually sticks to beer at least, instead of mainlining the cheapest whiskey he can find.

Tonight, though. Tonight. His brain’s practically rattling in the cage of his skull and he needs something, anything to soothe it.

He knew the day would come when it would be just him and Castiel in the bunker, and God knows it’s big enough to avoid the guy. But that doesn’t change the fact that Sam’s still at Jody’s safe house and Mary went out to a town a few miles over for dinner. She promised him she’d be back later; there was a distinctly concerned look on her face when she said it. It’s pathetic that his mom still had to coddle him like that, but she isn’t wrong to worry.

It’s just him and Castiel. Every breath, every heartbeat, they’re big and loud enough to fill the empty rooms. Castiel must feel it too, Dean’s sure. So Dean picks up the bottle and drains it.

There’s another. And then another. The world goes pleasantly woozy before him. Or – not pleasant, no, not a whole lot’s pleasant now. The thought should sober him up, but it whips anger through him instead, so potent he can practically feel it crackling.

He’s not surprised to find himself in the basement, even if he doesn’t remember taking the long path down there.

“You’re intoxicated,” Castiel says. The feathers on his wings flick out. Dean stares at them openly. The wide black reach welcomes him; it mocks him.

“You bet,” Dean slurs back. “Wanna guess why?”

“I can imagine it has something to do with me.” If it was possible to funnel your entire voice down to an eyeroll, Castiel would be doing it right now.

The irritation edges its way up Dean’s spine again. “I hate it when you find your sense of humor. It’s too much like –”

“Him. I know.”

Dean’s taken a lot of blows to the head. Had a lot of concussions. One of the worst occupational hazards, actually. But none of it has ever felt so sudden as the fury baring its sharp teeth inside him at that moment.

“No, you don’t know. You can’t know. Cas, he, uh. There was this one time when I was doin’ real bad – worse than this, you can’t even imagine, I almost _killed_ him – and Cas promised he was gonna be there until the end of things. Everyone else, they’d be dead, but not him. Not him. He was supposed to _be there_. That’s what he promised. But he’s gone.”

That’s what it is. That’s all it is. Cas promised him he’d be there until the end of time, and even in that moment, while Dean’s vision swam red and his blood pumped _kill kill kill_ , he thrilled to hear it.

Cas broke a lot of promises. Hurt him a lot. But in the end, that was the worst broken promise of all.

Castiel, for his part, doesn’t even react. “Relying on anyone is a poor idea. You’re a warrior. So am I. We can and should do things on our own.”

“God,” Dean spits, “that’s such an _angel_ thing to say. Making such a big deal about _family_ , then kicking out and _murdering_ anyone who puts a toe out of line. Cas, he could have found redemption with those douchebags, but he gave up an entire army of angels for me. And I failed. All he got for what he did was me bolting away from anyone who cared about me and fucking and fighting my way across the country. I was a goddamn demon. We were both stupid to have hope.”

At least Castiel falls silent at that. Good.

“There was this one angel, who –” He pauses to rub a hand over his face a couple of times. He pulls the hand back, and yup, telling Castiel all of this still seems like the worst but most satisfying idea he’s ever had. “Anybody named Hester in your flock over in your dimension?”

“Yes. A good warrior.”

“Not real surprised by that. Well, she showed up during this whole mess with other angels, and Leviathan, and a prophet – ugh, never mind that. She gave Cas this whole speech about how he was _lost_. And I _corrupted_ him.

“She was a real piece of work, let me tell you, but you know what I keep thinking? She wasn’t wrong. Cas, I think sometimes he was happy here. He loved burgers and the, uh, you know, the company. But in Heaven, yeah, the other angels _suck_ , but he had respect. He was like Big Dick McGeneral up there.”

“Impressive.” Castiel does not sound impressed when he says that.

Dean glares and pushes on. “The second Cas found me in Hell, I turned his life to shit. He cared about Sam too, Mom and all our friends, but everything terrible that happened to him, that was all on me. He gave up _everything_. His peace, his happiness, his sanity, his _life_. And for fucking what? Me? I’m not worth it.”

Dean’s head feels heavy enough that he wants to rest it on the table and fall asleep right there. His rage is still there, but tighter now, the kind that sticks in his throat and spreads itself thick over every word.

“Who are you even angry at?” Castiel asks, and Dean could strangle him for the condescension in his voice. But there’s something else there, and if Dean didn’t know better, he’d think Castiel sounds almost interested. Curious. Sympathetic. _Something_.

“I don’t know. Everyone. You, definitely. Cas, ‘cuz he’s fuckin’ gone, and he was stupid enough to care. And me, because – because it’s all my fault, anyway.”

Dean lets himself slump in the seat opposite Castiel, even as he looks everywhere but at the other dude. There it is. The anger, the drinking, the reason for everything that happened to Cas: in the end, it’s just himself.

After what seems like a very long time, Castiel speaks again. “I don’t think it was all your fault.” His voice is clipped, and his tone no different than usual. Still, Dean can’t even imagine the expression on his face when he looks back at Castiel. “You were all in impossible situations. Probably not as impossible as what’s happening in my dimension, but that you managed to form a friendship at all – I can’t imagine that would happen in many circumstances.”

“That’s the nicest thing you ever said to me,” Dean manages, before he’s laughing. Laughing and laughing and laughing.

In Dean’s dreams that night, he’s back in the barn again. When Cas says _I love you_ , the most awful and wonderful moment of Dean’s life, Dean says it back.

Then they’re kissing. They take in each other, desperate, and don’t stop. Until black rot pours into Dean’s mouth. He pulls back in horror, but it’s too late. Cas is falling to the ground like he’s in slow motion, the sweet heat, the _life_ , of his body already dissipating into the air.

In the night, the roof of the barn looks like a black sky. The dirt is so much like sand. The imprint of Cas’ wings spreads, wide but feeble, behind him in the exact same way.

Dean stares down in his mind’s eye and thinks, _This is what my love does._

 

 

*****

 

Jody left out a whole spread for them. Mini-sandwiches Sam can’t stop eating, browning guacamole, hummus, and chips. Right now, though, Alicia Banes is dipping a potato chip into the guacamole, humming a tune to herself as she does. She taps one heel against the other calf, half-swaying and dancing in place to the music only she can hear. She’s so _alive_.

Sam’s not sure if he’s shocked or completely unsurprised.

Either way, it must show on his face. Alicia grabs him by the arm and pulls him to the kitchen. God, last time he saw her – but now she’s absolutely hauling his ass around. Fear shudders its way through Sam’s nerves.

“Don’t make a big deal, it’s cool,” she tells him, before he can worry any more. “I know what happened. We talked about it. Wasn’t thrilled at first, but, well.” She flips up the hem of her shirt until she’s holding it like a skirt and does a little twirl around in place. “I’m here.”

Guilt flares in Sam. Shame. But behind it all, there’s – well, he can relate. “I know the feeling.”

“I’ve heard as much.”

“Is there anything you don’t know about me and my brother?” He’s somehow smiling when he says it, though. He figures that’s a good sign.

“Yeah, I –” She shifts in place, a serious expression falling over her face. “I should’ve called with condolences, but uh. Didn’t wanna freak you out? But I am so sorry, Sam. I wish I’d met Castiel. Sounds like he was a major badass. And I know it couldn’t have been easy for Dean, to lose someone like that.”

Sam’s tempted to ask what _someone like that_ is supposed to mean. Confirm something he’s always suspected. But in the end, it’s probably just part of the rumor mill, and Dean deserves better than that. “It’s appreciated,” he says, as Max walks in the room.

“Sam,” he greets, as he claps him on the back. Max is trying for steady, Sam can tell, but he hesitates just a bit before every movement. There’s a manic glint behind his eyes. “We all good?”

“We’re all good,” Sam assures him. “I think I’d be a giant hypocrite to say otherwise.”

The nerves seem to leech out of Max at that. “Good. Uh, glad we’re cool. Then you’re welcome to join us in Chicago any time. I heard what you and Alicia were talking about, and – maybe you need to get away for a while too.”

“Chicago?”

“Guess you’re not in on all the news, old man,” Alicia jumps in. “We’re relocating. The hunting on the road thing – it was a blast for a while, but well –”

“Well –” Max echoes, no bitterness behind it. “Seriously, though, we lost – we lost a lot this year. So we’re taking our talents to Chicago. Ennis Ross is a total badass, got things taken care of with the monster families years ago. British Men of Letters didn’t even go there.”

“What Max said,” Alicia chimes in. “Standing invite to you. Heard it through the grapevine that you’re not too bad at the spells yourself. Dean and your mom – they’re welcome too. We can be the world’s coolest zombie witches.”

Sam can’t help but laugh at that. He gives them both enormous hugs before they go their separate ways. Sometimes it’s good to get a reminder that the Winchester brand of crazy and tragedy isn’t the only brand of crazy and tragedy out there.

There’s a darkness inside Sam, one he’s never fully snuffed out or brought to the light. The crackling power that still lives in his bones, it scares him. He’s turned away from it since the (first) apocalypse, and tried so badly to keep control.

But none of this feels bad, or frightening. It just feels like potential, offered from friendly faces. From two people who understand. He’ll think about it, but he’s pretty sure he already knows the answer.

 

 

*****

 

Dean asks Sam or Mary to go to the basement for him. If Castiel says anything to either one of them, important or not, they don’t mention it. The two of them won’t stop giving Dean pointed looks, which he shrugs off best he can, but at least they don’t ask why he’s not going to the dungeon himself. He can be thankful for any small mercies.

Not that he’s ever getting his eight hours, but Dean doesn’t sleep well over those days. He spends most nights awake, pacing the bunker or searching the library. When he does snatch a few hours of sleep, he finds himself jolting awake too often, Jimmy Novak’s face and flat hair the last thing he saw in his dreams. Or Dick Roman using Cas’ body as his personal puppet, dark slime dripping down his face from his hairline. Lucifer’s nasty rictus grin twisting Cas’ face. And finally, of course, the image of Castiel sitting across from Dean, his expression too perfectly placid even as his wings rustle like they’re living on his own. Then he smiles, cold, and he’s gone.

It’s not Cas in his dreams. It’s never Cas, not any more. He’s not sure if that’s better or worse.

Dean goes back to the dungeon. He doesn’t know why. He’s at the end of his rope and he needs a friendly face. Or in this case, not really a friendly face, but a face he recognizes. That’s what he’s telling himself.

Now sober, Dean does a double take when he sees Castiel. The way he was strung up before, it’s nothing compared to now. His head and his wings are the only parts of him not wrapped in gleaming chains. Every movement he does, it catches the light.

The visual is almost funny, if not for – well. Everything.

“British Men of Letters were always over-prepared. Gotta give those limey bastards credit,” Dean says by way of introduction. “Not that they were ready for Sammy.” He crosses his arms across his chest and leans against the wall. It’s solid, the barrier he needs to steady himself against.

Castiel gives him a sidelong look, annoyance caught halfway outta the train station by confusion. Dude probably understood about a quarter of those words, so fair enough.

Dean doesn’t know what spurs him to push on. But he does anyway, because if he’s ever been good at one fucking thing, it’s obstinance. “Look, uh, Castiel. This ain’t fair. At all. To either one of us.”

For all his attempts at friendliness, all Dean gets in response from Castiel is an icy, “You’re sober now. It suits you better.”

“I’m almost forty,” Dean spits back. “Look, in human years, that’s when you start getting old. You start wanting massages, and a happy ending has nothin’ to do with it. Me, I’m almost forty and still getting drunk and – saying crap I rather wouldn’t. It’s just sad, man.” He lets out one low, humorless chuckle. “Guess I’ll just have to do all that sober instead.”

“You’ve done a fine job so far.” Compliments from Castiel are the last thing Dean expects, especially in that tone. “Not that I have much to compare it to.” _There_ it is.

Dean doesn’t wanna think about sobriety, or drinking, or why he’s drinking. Instead, he asks the question that’s been worrying at him like a loose tooth since the beginning. “Be honest. Could you get out of this?”

Castiel looks down at the chains criss-crossing his body. He’s trussed up like a turkey before the Thanksgivings Dean rarely ever had. “Any time I wanted to,” he admits at last.

Dean suspected as much, but just hearing the words puts him in fight or flight mode. His heart thumps thickly against his ribcage; his legs ache with the need to bolt outta here. “Then why’d you stay? Why are you still here?”

“I have nowhere to go.”

At that, Dean has to fight a laugh. Of course that’s why.

But he must have been glowering or showing some other kind of reaction, because Castiel shifts in his chair. It’s not a very Castiel kind of movement, and Dean feels his face slacken in surprise. “And it’s interesting here. I can admit that. Can I ask you a question now?”

“I guess it’s the least I could do.”

“Why do you keep coming back? Your brother, your mother, I see them here sometimes. You could stop coming down yourself. Surely there must be other people you know outside your immediate family –”

“Winchesters are kind of a special, weird, case. But we’re working on that.”

Castiel shoots him a look that shows he clearly didn’t appreciate the interruption. “ _My point is_ , you don’t have to keep coming back here. I appreciate duty, but this isn’t yours. So why are you still here?”

“Because I love Cas,” Dean says, automatically, like it’s the easiest thing in the world. “And I gotta do anything I can that might get him back. God, all I ever wanted was for him to stay, but I never said it. When he was human, he could have stayed. But I kicked him out. It was a shitty situation and I thought I had to, but – we could have worked it out. Together.”

“You tell me a lot,” Castiel says. Without judgment, for once. “Loyalty, that I understand. Even in the universe I come from, it saved me more than I’d like to admit. I don’t want to rely on anyone, but my brothers and sisters –”

“I’ve talked a lot of crap about angels, and that couldn’t have helped.” Dean ain’t gonna say he’s sorry for it, because he’s not, but it didn’t make things any easier.

Castiel shrugs his shoulders best he can with the chains holding him down. It’s still an unnatural gesture coming from him. “Our ways of life are different. You don’t understand me. I usually don’t understand you.”

“Usually?”

“Your loyalty is consistent. And it’s an admirable trait.”

“You don’t need to sweet-talk me, man. I put out _before_ the first date.”

Castiel blinks at him. Much like with his doppelganger, Dean wonders how he conveys annoyance with that action alone. There’s a silence, and Dean worries he’s ruined the moment, until Castiel continues. “It’s love I don’t understand. Your brother, your mother. The other Castiel.”

Dean can’t talk about Sam and Mary with Castiel. He’s kept them out of this. Sammy is his second heartbeat; he never had a choice, but he’d choose him every time anyway. Sam’s the one part of Dean he can feel okay loving. Mom, he used to love what he realizes now was the idea of her, an endless well of comfort and false memories of long nights in the kitchen. When she came back, yeah, it took some adjustments. But he loves her more now, because she’s human. Because she’s fucked up, like all the rest of them.

Cas, though. Cas.

“I tortured in Hell,” Dean says, his way of answering. “Cas found me, and I was carvin’ someone up. Oh, sure, the guy was a sleazy subprime lender, probably ruined more people’s lives than any vamp ever could. But his guts were in my teeth. I was _laughing_.

“Cas didn’t care. He told me I didn’t belong there and pulled me out. I screamed all the way back up to Earth. I tried to tear him apart. But I held on, God knows I held on. I only remember flashes, but I remember that much. He never really brought it up again back here, but he didn’t judge me for it. He knew who I was, he knew what I’d done. He still stuck around. Kept coming back, even though I should have – well, I told you about that already.”

“Now you have someone who sticks with you, even if it’s not who you wanted it to be,” Castiel says. “Is that why you haven’t driven an angel blade through my heart?”

“ _Jesus_ , dude, that’s morbid.” Dean’s fucking thrilled for the opportunity to make a joke. Castiel has surprised him a lot, but he’s never thrown him completely off like that.

No shit, Dean resents him. Resents everything he represents. Every time he sees Castiel, he relives the night Cas died, over and over. Sees the tear, throbbing between the two universes. Sees Cas rush out, sees the moment of hope before it collapses like Cas’ body. Sees Mom tumble in, every world working to screw her over again and again. Sees Castiel in the cabin’s kitchen, a look of wonder on his face he didn’t fucking earn.

But the angel blade thing – no way. He likes to think he’s past that kneejerk reaction. He _is_ past it, he tells himself, and actually believes it. But even without that assertion, there’s no way he could have brought himself to – do that to Castiel. His brain trips if he even thinks about it.

“I wouldn’t do that,” Dean says, at last. “I don’t get you. You don’t get me. That’s okay. But I thought you knew me better than that.”

“I _know_ you were in love with him,” is all Castiel says, after all that. He says _in love_ funny, almost swallowing the words.

Dean looks down at the floor, briefly. It doesn’t have any answers for him. Only the truth does. “Yeah,” he says, looking up again. His voice doesn’t even waver. “He was family, I loved him like a brother, I meant that when I told him. I think he knew how important that was. But there’d been something more there as long as I can remember. And he knew that too. Both of us knew it. And now he’s –”

“Do you think he’s dead? Or do you think he’s just _gone_?”

Dean’s asked himself this about a thousand times. He doesn’t know which is worse. Cas dying puts a final stamp on all Dean’s cowardice, a mark he’ll carry dark and harmful as Cain’s. It could turn his heart to rot. But it wasn’t his worst nightmare when it came to Cas. No, that was the other option.

“I don’t know. I – try and stay away from that topic. Hurts too damn much. I can’t think about it too much or I’ll lose it.” He laughs, completely black, before he hears his voice break on the next few words. “But it’s _all_ I think about. Cas, Cas –”

Castiel is a thing from another world, not in any way Cas. Dean doesn’t care. He calls him by Cas’ name and sinks to his knees. He’s that desperate, that _sloppy_ for anything he can get. He rubs his cheek against Castiel’s calves, because this is what he’s always been. Pathetic, needy for love even when it doesn’t exist.

His knees hurt where they dig into the stone of the floor. Castiel’s robes are rough enough to score his face. Dean doesn’t care. None of it hurts like his gut, his mind, his very bones have these past few months.

“I’m not him,” Castiel says, face looming far above Dean’s. And then, quietly, “I can’t be him. I don’t know how. From what you tell me, he was extraordinary. I can’t be that. I’m sorry.”

Dean doesn’t know what he was expecting from Castiel, but it sure wasn’t acknowledgement of just how amazing Cas was. Dean didn’t think Castiel remotely cared. It should make Dean proud, but it only takes another scoop out of his heart. He might as well shatter to bits, here on the floor, clinging to Castiel.

“I know,” he gasps. “I know you’re not him, and I – I’m not gonna – just let me do this, man. It’s the only chance I’m ever gonna get.”

The room is mostly silent; Dean knows he’s crying, he can feel it sliding down his face, but his tears are thankfully quiet, and the only other noise is the soft rattle of Castiel’s chains when he shifts to accommodate Dean’s weight. It’s totally against everything Dean knows about the guy, but Castiel lets Dean clutch at him. God, he does. They stay like that for a while, unmoving, until Castiel breaks the silence.

“If I could,” he says, at last, “I’d help you get him back. I’d help you find him. I would, Dean.” There’s a pause. The air crackles. “You make me want –”

The words send a chill through Dean’s entire body. He locks up even as he pushes away from Castiel’s leg. This is the last fucking thing he wanted, so of course it’s right here in his lap. “You – I can’t – not with you, I can’t –”

“Not like that,” Castiel says quickly, and maybe he really has learned some things here about proper human behavior. “Your soul, it’s – but it’s not me it calls to.”

“No kidding,” Dean replies with a half-hearted scoff, even as he relaxes back against Cas’ knee.

“I just _want_ ,” Castiel heaves out. “And I don’t even know what.”

There’s a long silence, both of them breathing in the near-darkness. Until Dean speaks up. “Wise man once said, _hello babies, welcome to Earth_. Well, Castiel, welcome to Earth.”

 

 

*****

 

Amarillo’s sweltering, but that’s no surprise at this time of year. Texas in late August sucks the big one. The days are getting shorter, darker, giving the baddies more cover, but the temperature still boils. The weather app on Sam’s phone has stubbornly read _93_ the past four times he’s checked it.

The Impala’s A/C rattles, halfway to a death wheeze. For his part, Sam just tries to stick his face as close to the nearest vent as he can.

Dean keeps driving. Smiling as he does, even if it doesn’t reach his eyes. “I am so glad to get outta the bunker,” Dean sighs. The headlights cut through the road as the Impala rumbles on. “Away from –” He cuts himself off.

“Yeah,” is all Sam says. At least on a hunt he doesn’t have to worry about whether all of them are gonna end up murdered in the middle of the night by an avenging angel. Or where Dean’s stashed all his booze and if Sam’s going to find him face-down in a puddle of it.

No, on a hunt he only has bloodthirsty monsters to worry about. He shakes his head and sighs as Dean pulls up to a ramshackle cabin along the side of the road. Indistinct gray material crumbles around its foundation.

Dean shuts the car off and heat floods the inside. “This is the address Eileen gave us, right?”

Sam snorts. “You see anywhere else that’d fit the description?”

“Not gonna admit that was a good point.” Dean swings the car door open, grabs the weaponry he’s stored in the trunk, and tromps into the house. He opens the door and it swings off the top hinge.

Sam hustles to follow him. He’s still not sure how much he trusts Dean on his own when he’s – when he’s like this.

The shack’s just one room, as far as Sam could tell, and the windows are all boarded up. There’s a horrible rattle coming from somewhere in the darkness. The simultaneous thrill and puke-inducing nerves of a hunt swoop through Sam instantly.

As his eyes adjust, he sees a couple of ghouls with their heads lifted toward them. Their mouths, their chins, are stained the sick brown color of dried blood.

Sam raises his gun, trying to get a good enough shot to fire off, but he’s already too late.

Dean’s jumped into the fray. He forgot his gun somewhere by Sam, but he’s brandishing an enormous machete instead. Sam hasn’t seen him use that in years. Three ghouls lurch at Dean, but he makes three slices of the machete, so fast Sam swears they defy physics, and then the ghouls are on the ground.

Dean works like Sam’s rarely seen him. One ghoul grabs Dean from behind, but Dean slams his head back; the ghoul releases its grip and goes staggering. Dean grabs it by the shoulder in return, and cleaves its fucking head in half. He chops at it again for good measure. Sam shoves his arm against his nose to cover the stench.

Dean knifes the next ghoul through the gut. Another one gets taken out at the knees. They’re moving too slow for Dean right now; he cuts them down before they’re even aware of what’s happening. Two more heads go flying, one right after the other.

Sam catches a glimpse of Dean’s face. A slash of dirt stands out on his cheek, and he’ll be complaining about it after the hunt’s done, but for now it just makes him look more feral. He’s breathing hard, but his expression makes Sam’s breath catch with horror. There’s _nothing_ there.

It might have been the last time Dean hunted so ferociously, but this isn’t the Mark of Cain all over again. Dean relished hunting when he had the Mark, drank down sheer joy when taking out a nest of baddies. The heartbreak that’s wormed its way into Dean now, though, it’s left him empty.

Sam does manage to get the last ghoul, hanging back away from the others; he shoots it right in the face. It stumbles back and falls with a wet squish, like a bag full of wet concrete.

“Oh, that’s _gross_ ,” Dean says, the syllables drawn out by his heaving breath. There’s viscera all over his jacket. It’s not one of his favorite ones, Sam knows, but still. “Thanks for the backup, Sammy!”

He claps his hand on Sam’s shoulder to head back outside. His fingers are trembling.

“Torch it?” Dean asks, nodding his head toward the cabin, once they’re standing on the grass again. Long droplets of sweat trickle down his face and slink under the collar of his shirt. He pulls off his ruined jacket and chucks it onto the remains of the broken door, into the ghouls’ resting place.

Sam can’t help but feel like a couple of months ago, Dean might’ve tried to salvage that jacket at whatever laundromat they found that wouldn’t ask questions. Still, Sam nods, and they spend a few minutes pouring gasoline all over the house that no one’s gonna miss. Dean lights a match and watches it all go up in flames.

Night’s still too damn hot. The fire’s not helping. Neither is Sam’s mood.

His phone buzzes in his pocket. **Backup’s on its way** , Eileen’s text reads. At least he can smile at that.

_Appreciate it, but we took care of the ghouls_ , Sam texts back. The air stinks like choking smoke, which is normally a sign of a hunt well done. (Hunting’s kinda messed up sometimes.) Only in this case –

Sam hazards a look over at his brother, still standing ramrod straight. He’s too close to what’s left of the shack. His figure is just a silhouette against the fire’s light. Sam keeps an eye on Dean, afraid of him getting swallowed up in that fire if he looks away too long.

Sam’s phone buzzes again. He’s not sure if he appreciates the distraction or it’s just going to make him more paranoid.

**Well then it’s company. And me too if you don’t mind :)**

_Of course not._ He adds, _We could really use it._

Dean’s still standing in front of the fire when an unremarkable navy car rolls up a few minutes later. It’s not Eileen who comes out of the car, though, but a younger hunter. Sam doesn’t recognize her. She has a close-cropped haircut, and even in the blistering heat she’s wearing an ugly oversized olive-colored jacket over her other clothes. She digs around in the trunk of her car and pulls out a shovel.

“Hey guys, long time no see.” She sticks the shovel in the ground and pokes her hip in its direction, grinning maniacally wide. “Tell me where to start digging. We can catch up later. Eileen’s like twenty minutes behind me and she promised me drinks on her, as long as you two order the pinkest drinks she can find.”

Sam squints at her. Something’s so familiar there, and she’s certainly talking like she knows them. Dean looks away from the fire at last, and Sam nearly chokes on his breath of relief at the life in his eyes. “Krissy?” he asks.

Of course. Sam didn’t recognize her with the new haircut, and – Krissy always had an attitude, but this is different. This is _manic_. But Sam’s not gonna comment because God knows he’s been worse, and the girl in front of him, that’s definitely Krissy.

“We mostly finished up here, but you can –” Dean starts, but Krissy drops the shovel and then she’s off. She takes the canister of gasoline, makes sure she steps back a couple of paces, and then tosses the rest of it onto the roof of the house. Flames bloom, and the roof collapses instantly.

“I can help?” Dean approaches her, but she waves out with a hand that smacks Dean across the chest, so sharp and so surprising that he actually stumbles backwards a step or two. “Or not.”

Sam’s starting to wonder if he should’ve busted out the holy water and silver when Krissy showed up.

It’s only a couple minutes later when Eileen’s car rumbles into the plain, which is empty except for the road and the fire, sizzling to ash now. Krissy’s picked up her shovel again, and she’s started digging a shallow grave where they’ll pile that ash. Unpleasantly, Sam thinks of the time Gabriel had Dean stay dead for six months, and Sam obsessed over organizing the weapons in the Impala. Making the beds, all hospital corners. Making sure every hunt went perfect, to make up for the one where everything went wrong.

When Eileen gets out of the car, Sam’s not really proud of how long his hug with her goes on for. It’s just that this is the first time he’s seen her since the British Men of Letters crap, he tells himself. He knows she was okay, because they’ve been in contact, but seeing her on a Skype screen is different than having her right here. (She’s way more beautiful in person – no, he’s not going there.)

After a while, he pulls back enough that he’s sure Eileen can see his lips. _Glad to see her, but is Krissy okay?_ he whispers.

Eileen’s grimace in response tells him all he needs to know, but she still mouths back, _I’ll tell you about that one later._

Sam can practically sense Dean’s judgmental eyebrows raised behind him. Whatever, he’s having an _important conversation_ , Dean.

They all ride off, the four of them in three cars. Eileen says she knows a bar in town a couple of miles back.

“We’re, uh, dressed okay?” Sam asks when Eileen brings it up.

She smiles and – yep, that’s definitely a once-over. “Well, I think you look great.”

His mood lifts. Only a couple of degrees. But it’s something.

The bar’s really nice, actually. It’s the kind of awesome bar Sam rarely gets to see, one that weds nice dark wood paneling with neon pink fluorescents climbing the walls. When he slides in next to Eileen at the table, Dean’s eyes practically glitter in delight. Sam shoots him a look, lips pursed, but at least Dean is acting like a human being now. Viscera-free and everything.

True to Krissy’s word about the free drinks, Sam and Dean both order a goddamn Cosmopolitan. Eileen, of course, gets to slam down a Guinness, which neither of them grumble over too much. Krissy goes for some froo-froo thing called a frosé. “Hey –” Dean protests, once she’s ordered.

“I’m twenty-two. It’s fine.”

“I just mean those’ll kill ya.” Sam’s more than a little amused at the fact that Dean knows what a frosé is, and knows that it’s apparently near deadly too. Dean gives the drink an enormous glare when it arrives at the table, but doesn’t say anything else.

“So what have you guys been up to these past, oh, five years?”

Dean leans forward, elbows on the table. “Sam hit a –”

“A dog? Yeah, I _did_ hear that one.” She laughs, even if it doesn’t reach her eyes. “You gotta recycle all your stories? Just how boring have your lives been, anyway?”

Sam and Dean exchange a glance that goes on a second too long. “Well.” Dean speaks up, eventually. “Guess what. I killed Hitler.”

Krissy’s eyebrows jump up until they’re halfway up her forehead. “Now that’s a new one.”

Dean’s eyes light up and he starts chattering. Sam’s glad things are easy, for now. Eileen’s right next to him, and every time she gestures their thighs touch. But Dean’s all twitchy in a way Sam knows he only gets when he’s nervous about something but trying to bury it, and it’s pulling Sam’s attention in too many directions.

And Krissy – something’s very different with Krissy. Not just the hair. Sam considers himself an expert on that, thanks. It’s the too-breezy attitude, the hand-waving so broad she’s actually smacking people. Her persona, all bravado. Shit, she’s reminding Sam of –

Dean notes, “Nice bling,” mouth charmingly full of mozzarella sticks.

Sam didn’t notice it before, but it’s impossible not to now that Dean’s pointed it out. Krissy’s wearing two necklaces: her dad’s, and a ring on a chain. The diamond set on the ring is so enormous, it’s probably fake.

At Dean’s words, the expression on Krissy’s face goes dark. She’s been playing with her drink more than actually drinking it, stirring the straw through it over and over again until it’s almost a liquid texture rather than a frozen one. Now, though, she skips the straw entirely to hold the glass up to her lips, tilt it, and chug the whole drink down. Eileen shifts next to Sam; he can feel her tight intake of breath.

“Thanks,” Krissy says at last. “It was Aiden’s.” She looks over her shoulder a couple of times. The too-big grin is gone. “I could use some air. Too smoky in here.” It’s a non-smoking bar. But she’s on her way out anyway.

Dean follows her. Sam waits a couple of beats, then asks, “What the hell happened there?”

Eileen also looks around the bar. It’s pretty crowded in here by now. She starts signing, going slow, because Sam’s learning. Because he likes signing and it’s useful, he’s told himself a couple of dozen times. _How loud is it in here? Could you hear me if I talked low?_

Sam manages to stutter-sign back, _Very. And probably not._

Eileen gestures for him to follow her. He does, fighting off the shiver that tiptoes up his spine when she crooks her finger, and they head outside too. The night’s still hot, a dusty wind in the air. Maybe a couple hundred feet in the flat distance, Krissy is talking to Dean. She’s animated; he’s all stiff shoulders. “This probably isn’t how Krissy wanted to catch up,” Sam mutters.

“The British Men of Letters killed Aiden,” Eileen tells him with no preamble. Sam’s head swoops, and not because those watered-down $13 Cosmopolitans were too strong. “He was only twenty-four.”

The chairs propped outside the bar are old and rickety and creak dangerously under his weight, but Sam sinks into one anyway. “I knew Aiden,” he says. “Met him once, years ago. He was kind of a, uh, bratty kid when I met him –”

“Don’t speak ill of the dead,” Eileen interrupts, but she’s smiling as she says it. Sadly, but still.

“But that’s just it,” Sam continues. “He was a _kid_.”

He looks out at Krissy. She looks less agitated now. Dean’s got his hand on her shoulder, and whatever he’s saying, she’s listening. Good, that’s good. “Krissy and Aiden, they were a great hunting team. From what she’s told me, which isn’t much, she was the bait for the dragon, and he was going in to kill it. Brits showed up, took out the dragon.” She looks away. Her eyelashes slip against her cheek. “Took out Aiden. She saw everything.”

Sam can’t see Krissy’s face from this angle. But her back, her shoulders, they’re ramrod-straight. It’s the stance of another orphan. Another person who lost the love of their life. Ten years gone, more than that, and it’s like a nasty knife to Sam’s side when he sees it.

“We should have kept in better contact with them,” Sam spits out. His anger’s split fifty-fifty, half for himself and half for this goddamn life. “I’m starting to think I should have done a lot of things.”

Eileen reaches out, touches his arm. Her fingers are grounding. He’s still angry, but it’s the burning coal in his gut that never goes out; it’s not the scary whiplash that threatens to raze half the world until it settles. “You can beat yourself up until the day you’re underground,” she says, “and I get it. The people I couldn’t save, the people I left behind, they’re the last thing I think of every night. That dickweed Man of Letters, and I didn’t even _like_ him. Obviously.” She shakes her head.

Sam feels his cheeks blaze when she says _dickweed_. It’s hot out, he tells himself.

“But I keep going,” Eileen continues. “Because in this life, it’s the only thing I’ve ever been really good at.”

Somehow, Sam finds himself smiling. “You give pretty good advice,” he says. “Maybe psych’s more for you, and law never was.”

“Lawyers are way scarier monsters.” The neon from the bar glows pink on her face; her cheeks shine, and she’s gorgeous. “Krissy, she – I think she needs time. Josephine’s taking the next semester at Northwestern off to come home for a while. They’ve been through a lot already. They’ll make it.”

“They’re still in Kansas?”

“Yeah.”

“We’ll visit. We really will.” Sam takes a few beats to look at Eileen’s face again, pale skin and dark hair and eyes. He’s going on thirty-five, he shouldn’t be this thrown off by a pretty face and kindness. “We lost a lot of good people this year. It wasn’t a Men of Letters thing, but Cas, I mean –”

“Jody and Alex and Claire said he was badass. I’m sorry I never got to meet him. A real angel, wow.”

Sam lets the corner of his lip tilt up, just a little bit, in the memory of his friend. “Yeah, he was. I’m sorry too. He was the best friend we’ve ever had. And for Dean, he –” He cuts himself off. Whatever he was going to say about Dean and Cas, it doesn’t feel like it’s his to share. “He was even closer than I was to Cas. I dunno how he’s handling it. Not well, anyway. I’m trying, but it’s hard. Crowley sacrificed himself for us too, and he was the King of Hell. I mean, I was always – we had a weird relationship, I can say that much. But what do you even do with that?”

Eileen smiles. It’s not a big smile, not a happy one. Sam’s heart jumps too high anyway. “You keep going. Because of it.”

Footsteps approach them. Dean and Krissy, again. “Hey,” Krissy says when she sees them. She’s smiling, but it’s sad. There’s a softness behind her eyes; she looks much more like the Krissy Sam and Dean knew than the girl throwing elbows and tossing down glorified frozen daiquiris. “I’m sorry about – all of that.”

“No need.” Sam reaches forward to give her another hug. “I think we all get it.”

“It’s been a tough year,” Krissy sighs. The diamond around her neck catches the pink light blinking in the bar.

“Tell me about it.”

She nods to Sam. “I think I can now.”

The four of them move back toward the bar. Sam pulls on Dean’s shoulder, keeping him outside.

“Quality time with me?” Dean smirks. He’s all bravado and big genuine smiles now. The only thing more worrying than Dean’s moods these days is how quickly they shift. “Woulda thought you wanted some with –”

“Don’t say it,” Sam grumbles. “What’d you tell Krissy?”

Dean visibly swallows at Sam’s question. The smirk drops just as quickly and obviously as if he’d been physically holding it up. “That it’s gonna hurt like a son of a bitch for a long time yet,” he says, after a while. “That there’s no normal after what she’s lost. That hurt is – it’s okay to feel it sometimes.”

Sam looks at his brother for too long after. He sees Dean gathering up Cas’ trenchcoat from the water, even though it smelled like rotting pond scum. Sees Dean kneeling at Cas’ side for so long there were grooves in the sand until the rain came and washed them away. Hell, he sees Dean on the hunt all of a couple of hours ago, no expression on his face as he single-mindedly destroyed the nest of ghouls.

“Sometimes I wish you’d take your own advice,” is all Sam says before he walks back into the bar. He wipes off his forehead and wills his breath, his heartbeat, to return to normal. That Amarillo night’s still stifling.

 

 

*****

 

Dean’s been expecting this call, but he still cringes when he reads the name on the front of his phone. It had to happen sometime, though, so he squeezes his eyes shut and picks up.

“Hi, Dean,” Claire says. He can’t read her tone.

“Claire, hey,” he says. Any attempt at hiding the sadness woven deep into his voice would be pointless right now. “I should have called you, but… I didn’t know what to say. We really fucked up. I’m sure you know. Uh – sorry – but God, Claire, I don’t even know what to say. We lost your dad. Years ago, but I never said anything about that, and I’m sorry. And then we lost –”

“Cas wasn’t my dad,” Claire grits out on the other side of the line. “There was a time when I was, you know, pretty messed up, and I thought about _using_ him like that, and you know that. But it wasn’t fair to either of us. No, Cas wasn’t my dad. But he meant a lot to me, and – and if he meant half of what he did to me to you, then I’m sorry. Yeah, you messed up not calling me. But I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry too.” Dean doesn’t think he’s ever said _I’m sorry_ in his life as much as he has these past couple of months.

The conversation dies for a few beats, until Claire chuckles, darkly. “I shouldn’t tell you this,” she mutters.

“What?”

“You never really forget when you’re – you know. A vessel. Chained to a comet, I think I heard once. But when the comet leaves you, sometimes I guess they leave behind, uh, some comet dust.”

“You’re losing me with this metaphor.” Dean’s surprised at how light his voice sounds now. Claire’s a good kid.

“I’m thinking out loud, gimme a break,” she sighs. Dean can practically see her eye roll. Then she pushes on. “I could still feel his emotions sometimes. For years. There were times when I _wanted_ him out of my life forever, but I couldn’t do it. He was always a flicker in the back of my mind. And I was calling you for condolences, but… he isn’t gone.” She laughs, with tears behind it. “I’d _know_. And I should have called you months ago, too, but he’s not gone.”

Dean goes cold. “Come on, Claire. Don’t do this.”

“I wouldn’t if I wasn’t sure, Dean. You really think I’m that much of an asshole? Geez.”

“I –”

“I’m kidding. Jokes. Those exist, Manpain McGee.”

Dean wants to be mad that she’s making jokes. But she’s a kid. (Even if she’s nineteen now. Even if she had to grow up too damn fast.) And she’s right; she’s got an attitude but a big heart too. She really _isn’t_ an asshole. And the certainty in her voice –

“Oh, and Dean? If – when – you get him back. Those emotions I could feel? Maybe talk to him about them.”

“ _Goodbye_ , Claire,” Dean insists, emotions warring in his head and heat blooming over his cheeks. He presses the button to end the call, then sits with his phone in his hand and stares at it for a while. _He’s not gone_ echoes in his head.

Dean has little hope or faith. Life taught him that those things, they never work out. But Mick – Dean kinda misses that douchebag too, because they’ve lost too much, and he’d really come through in the end – had called Claire a walking miracle.

She is. And out there, somewhere, Dean wants to believe, there are others.

 

 

*****

 

On the other side of the call, Claire finds herself staring at the phone, too, at least until the shower shuts off and Abigail comes out of the bathroom, one towel wrapped around herself and the other in her hands, furiously scrubbing at her hair. “I can’t believe you have the _Winchesters_ on your phone,” she says, humor and doubt dueling in her voice.

“And you wouldn’t believe what gigantic losers they are,” Claire returns. “Seriously, when you meet them –”

“ _When_? We’re making plans now?” A wry grin makes its way onto Abigail’s face as she pulls her shower cap off, then drops the towel in order to get dressed.

Claire’s understandably a little distracted at that, but she manages to get words out eventually. “They’re good and like, _normal_ guys – I’m telling you, they are,” she says, to Abigail’s skeptical look, “and last time I was with them they bought me like, a friggin’ feast because I let it slip I was eating Gas ‘n’ Sip burritos.”

“Maybe the Winchesters aren’t so bad, those fucking suck,” Abigail says, pulling on a t-shirt and a Henley in quick succession over her head. “Those microwave breakfast sandwiches, though –”

“With the plastic cheese? You’ve been on the road too long.”

“And you like those bland-ass burritos, so.” Abigail laughs and throws her old t-shirt, the one she had on before the shower, in Claire’s direction. It lands right on her head. Claire laughs right back, tosses the shirt away, and follows her out of the room.

The two of them met at a bar. A classy joint, she’ll have you know, even as they let her in without so much as a glance at her fake ID. Abigail wasn’t Claire’s usual type; her hair was pin-straight and she was skinny enough to be called _spindly_ , all elbows and sharp knees that actually hurt when she dug in too hard with them. Claire found her drinking some ridiculous drink with a big slice of pineapple on the rim, even. It didn’t matter. She was drawn in instantly. Captivated, embarrassingly enough.

They’d gone back to Claire’s motel room and fooled around. That would have been the end of it, except they both woke up in the morning to Abigail’s phone blaring “I Don’t Wanna Wait.” Claire teased the hell out of her about that, because seriously, what year was it? But her words faded away when she learned Abigail’s hunter aunt was calling about a haunting in South Dakota she couldn’t take time off work to deal with.

Claire wanted to check in with Jody in person anyway, she’d told herself. Taking a little trip with a pretty and cool hunter girl was just a bonus.

That was a couple of months ago now. What was supposed to be a one-night stand turned into, so far, a seventy-four-night stand. Claire can’t say she really minds it. Her heart stopped earlier this year; if she can find happiness, well, she’s going to take it while she’s still here.

And Abigail herself is – great. Amazing, really. Claire hates getting sappy, but she can’t really help it when she thinks of the way Abigail always goes by _Abigail_ and never ever _Abby_ , her loyalty to her service greyhound Carina, her gorgeous fucking crossbow, and the very undignified squeak she makes when Claire bites her nipples.

So yeah. She’s gone sappy. That’s part of why she called Dean. Castiel might have only possessed her for a few minutes, but every millisecond he inhabited her body might have been a millennium. And all she could feel that entire time, what she practically _swam_ in, was his love for Dean.

Back then, Cas had an even bigger stick up his ass than he does now. (Claire thinks of him as a creature of _now_. She’s sure of it.) She’s not sure he understood his own feelings. Probably still doesn’t. Claire herself was only twelve at the time, with no context for any of it other than how her mom and dad used to smile at each other sometimes. But that love, that kind of love, the kind that made a supernova settle all its focus and power and care onto just one man, it got seared into her bones. She carries it in her soul.

So that’s what she’s been looking for ever since, in a way. It’s only been two and a half months with Abigail. And she can’t understand the way Cas loved, like the way the tide comes in and out, over and over, eternally. But she thinks she could get close.

Claire slips her phone into the pocket of her leather jacket, because she digs being a cliché sometimes, and slides into the shotgun seat in Abigail’s car, a Honda Accord – how embarrassing – from a couple of years ago, with Carina curled up in the backseat, snoring loudly.

This stupid car, it feels like where Claire belongs. That sense she always carries in her soul flares up, a hopeful spark. The two of them take off together.

 

 

*****

 

“Hey, Cas. Uh, if you’re out there. I don’t know – don’t know if you are. But I’m not saying goodbye yet. I said you sucked at them but man, I’m worse. You can’t even imagine,” Dean says. “Look, I can barely keep track of what month it is. But I saw the date today. September 18. Four months since – since everything.

“But also –” Dean pauses, to chuff out laughter. “I know you know what day it is, too. Kinda hard to forget. I know we really met a few days later, but – that gas station – I _felt_ something, man.”

Whatever he felt, it had rattled his very brain inside his skull, seared his shoulder bright pink-red, filled him with terror and wonder alike. Within a year, that force would be his best friend. After a little more than a year, it’d be – well. Dean doesn’t think about it too much, except for how he can never _stop_ thinking about it.

“I regret a lot. Everything. Sometimes I regret that we met, you know, not because – just that I must’ve screwed everything up for you. I’m sorry, okay? I’m even less for apologies than I am goodbyes, so don’t get used to it.” He laughs again.

“But if there’s something I don’t regret, it’s telling you I needed you. Not the best of situations, yeah, and I should have said more, but – it was as simple as that. Still is. Like I lost an arm, Cas. A leg. Maybe – some other organ, I don’t know.” He doesn’t say what other organ, because as much as he’s always tried to be brave, as much as he _knows_ the true norths lodged inside him and guiding him – when it comes to putting those feelings out in the open, he’ll fall short time and time again.

“I needed you then. I’ve needed you all along, I still need you. Just… if you’re out there. Come home, buddy.”

Dean’s fingers have been gripping the frame of his bed so hard, and for so long, that he’s worried they’re stuck like that. But he pulls his fingers back at last and flexes them once, twice.

He doesn’t sleep that night. Mary’s been making her way through the bunker library, and she left him a couple of books on the war room table. He flips through all of them, looking for something, anything about nephilim, but there’s exactly _fuck_ and _all_ about that in the books. Just a bunch of outdated crap on how to hunt djinns and wraiths.

He lets his eyes shut as he catches his chin in his palm. A nearly featureless sky and land swims into view. Both sky and ground are the yellow of a fading bruise; nothing separates them in appearance save the flat line of the horizon and a few plumes of shifting violet smoke.

_We’re almost there_ , a voice says. Dean hears a swish that could be a coat, and then his eyes snap open.

His heart hammers against his ribcage. Under his clothes, his skin’s overheated with a clammy layer on top – pretty friggin’ gross. He tries to turn the page in a book, but his hands are shaking too hard; he almost tears the page instead.

He places his palms flat on the table, willing them to steady. He breathes. When he blinks, he swears it’s that same dull yellow behind his eyelids.

He doesn’t think. He keeps reading, even if it’s just running his eyes over the same words over and over again. He’s pushing on, is the thing, because it’s the one thing he can do.


	3. Chapter 3

The rain’s drumming so loudly outside Dean can hear it from his room, which feels like it’s been stuffed inside a tin can. Thunder growls hard enough to shake the floor. When he casts a look at the clock, it reads _6:32_. He’s pretty sure that’s PM. He grunts and slams the book he’s reading shut.

This kind of weather at least gives him an excuse for not going outside, and he’s tempted to do nothing but move his butt to bed and try to get to sleep. Instead, he finds himself tugging on his boots and tossing on a couple of button-ups, before he wanders up and up and up through the bunker, walking up staircases he’s almost sure he’s never taken before. His footsteps thunk on every metal step, almost as loud as the rain.

It’s still pouring when he finally gets outside, to an odd sloping roof that leads down to another driveway, one they never use. Even with the tread on his boots, he has to be careful that he doesn’t slip. Puddles, swelling quick, spot the ground outside, drowning any grass, setting the gravel outside the bunker off in little bumpy rivers of their own.

Despite the rain, there are no distinct clouds that Dean can see. Instead, the sky’s a screaming, damn near apocalyptic pink-orange. The last of the sun sinks into the flat horizon, and the entire world glows with its light. Every raindrop looks like a crystal until it splatters on the ground and breaks the illusion.

When Cas was in the bunker and not holed up watching Netflix, he spent a lot of his time sitting up on the top of the slope. From this vantage point, there’s nothing but long stretches of golden field and gnarled trees, as far as the eye can see. The sky, beautiful and deadly at once, it’s a better memorial to him than Dean could ever offer.

Cas would have loved this weather. Castiel wouldn’t know how to appreciate it.

The last time Dean saw thunder crack the sky, back in Washington, that thunderstorm was the one thing that finally drove him back inside and off the beach. Or, more accurately, it had sent Sam outside to hoist him up by one arm. Over the driving rain, Sam had been saying something – screaming it, really – but fuck if Dean could make it out. Until Sam started howling _Jack_ and _disappeared_ enough that Dean got the picture.

‘Course, he hadn’t needed Sam to tell him that. Not when Cas – Cas’ body, Cas’ _corpse_ , the one thing left of Cas – had disappeared before the first droplets hit the ground. Once Dean got inside the house, he hadn’t even bothered to dry off before he started slurping down rotgut from who knows where.

Seems like the rain’s gonna keep falling no matter where he is. The morning after the ghoul hunt in Amarillo, he woke up in the motel to sheets of rain sloughing down the window. The remnants of a hurricane blowing through, but they’d be gone soon. It was still so hot out there that steam hovered a good foot above the ground, but the rain kept pouring. He thought of Krissy, hoped she was on her way back to Josephine, and actually sent her a goddamn text about it, because he was going to keep in touch with people before it was too late.

But then he’d been left with nothing but his thoughts. He’s gotta stop thinking of one of the worst nights of his life.

_If it keeps on rainin’, levee’s gonna break._ That was one of the songs he put on the mixtape he made for Cas, after all. Lot of the time, the tension between them felt like that rain sometimes, swelling the reservoir until it spilled over the banks of the river.

But the levee never got its chance to break. Now Dean’s left with nothing else but another lyric in that song: _cryin’ won’t help you, prayin’ won’t do you no good._

Lightning flashes, not too far in the distance now. One precise yellow strike puts Dean on edge as it spears against the ground, setting a copse of withered trees and dried grass into a bright flare of flames that the rain washes away in seconds. The wind carries the stink of ash through the air, right to him. Too close.

All of a sudden, he realizes that the rain isn’t falling on him. He’s been out here what’s gotta be fifteen minutes now, his jacket’s practically leaden with the weight of the water, and there’s paths of rainwater snaking their way around his boots – but none of it touches his skin.

Oh, shit. His guts twist hard and spike nausea through him. He’s pissed off way too many assholes with too much juice lately –

And then the lightning strikes, not twenty feet in front of him. He finally loses his footing and falls hard on his ass in the gravel. It digs into his sides, scratches at his back. Fuck.

The bolt missed Baby, and it didn’t hit him directly, but there’s not much else to be grateful for. His vision still swoops with the aftereffects of something so bright so damn close to him; the world’s stark black and white now, the beautiful screaming pink of the sky now just another flat bone-blanched sheet.

Dean has nothing to defend himself with. He’s lying prone on his back in this freaky rain, half-blinded by the lightning, hands scrabbling in the gravel to try and get a grip. The hot stink of the bolt’s impact clogs his nose. It sweeps away suddenly, with an icy gust, and then there’s nothing but petrichor rising all around him, cradling him.

There’s pressure on his hand. Something grabbing it. Someone who’s very warm, even as the cold rain slips in little icy trails down his hand.

Dean looks up. The world’s not black and white any more; his eyes have adjusted.

But all he can see is blue.

He’s on his feet before he knows it. The angles on the face in front of him are stark as they ever were, but they’re softened by the tilt of his smile. It ain’t a big smile, because Cas’ never were – never _are_. But a whole galaxy of feelings rotates its way through it.

“Hello, Dean,” Cas says, real and whole and holding Dean’s hand.

“Cas,” is all Dean can say. One word and the whole world before him. His voice breaks halfway through the single syllable.

They’re wrapped up in an embrace between one second and the next. Dean’s not sure who initiated it. Both of them, maybe. Their cheeks push together at an awkward angle, and their arms are stuck and tangled up in each other, and the rain’s sliding all over them, and none of it matters.

It’s closeness and comfort like Dean can rarely remember. He digs his nose into the crook of Cas’ neck. They breathe together; their hearts beat together.

They break apart eventually, though they only put a sliver of distance between them. Dean’s hand slides up to cradle Cas’ cheek. “How did you –”

“It’s a long story. I hope I have time to tell you –”

“All the time you need, man.” Dean knows he’s babbling; his words are more like gasps than actual words. He doesn’t give a shit, not now. “Sam, Mom, we all missed you.”

“I missed them too. You can’t imagine –”

“I think I can,” Dean breathes out, and he laughs. He actually laughs. “Man, if you die on me again, I’m gonna _kill_ you.”

“Dean, that doesn’t make –”

“It makes perfect sense.” Dean’s still laughing. Shock and relief buoy him. And that smile on Cas’ face, too, small and searching but real.

Cas’ smile goes wider. “To the bunker then?” Dean nods his approval and hustles him inside, keeping him close as possible without – God – without tangling their fingers together.

They’re barely back inside, hands brushing together with every step, when Dean hears a scream that slices through the sound of the rain. It’s gotta be his mom, and she _never_ sounds like that. He rushes down the stairs, Cas hot on his heels, in the direction of the scream.

They find Mary in the kitchen. When they get there, a young kid, maybe eleven or twelve, whiplash-skinny but otherwise nondescript, stands in the doorway. His clothes slump off him and his posture’s terrible. None of it hides the power haloing his body.

Dean didn’t even see the kid like Sam did. But even before the stranger’s green eyes go bright yellow, Dean knows who he is, and he’s scrambling to his feet and away from the entryway to the kitchen.

Jack is smiling. Dean’s weirded out by how _not_ unsettling it is. It’s certainly not his dad’s awful, wicked slash of a grin; it’s the big, goofy smile of a _kid_.

“Get out of here, _Jack_ ,” Mary hisses, because apparently Dean’s mouth isn’t working right now. She clenches her fist around the handle of her empty coffee mug; judging by the way her biceps flex with the force of her grip, she is more than ready to smash a ceramic mug against the skull of Lucifer’s kid. “Or give us a good explanation.”

The smile on Jack’s face vanishes. Worry darkens his expression; it’s a weird look on a kid who hasn’t cracked thirteen years old yet. “I’m not here to taunt you,” he says. He sounds almost – hurt.

“I’ll make a long story short.” Another voice, with a smile in it, chimes in from the entryway; Dean has to step aside to make room for Kelly. She looks good, with a smile that reaches her eyes and an ease to her step Dean never saw from her before. “Jack revived us.”

She squeezes Jack’s shoulders. The gesture is half hopelessly awkward and half incredibly endearing.

“When he did that, his powers – he wasn’t used to them. He tore open the path to another universe. And then a few… thousand… more, when he tried to get us all back.”

“Us?” Mary echoes. There’s a fierce hope alight in her eyes, until she looks over her shoulder and catches a glimpse of Dean and Cas, together. “Cas, is that – are you –”

“It’s him,” Dean says. He hates to separate from Cas’ side. But pushing him toward his mom, keeping a hand right at the small of his back – that’s gotta be the least bad way to say goodbye.

Mary winds her arms around Cas’ shoulders. His eyes pop open wider for a second, before he’s hugging her back. He’s learning. He really is. He’s gonna have _time_ to learn, if Dean has anything to do with it.

“So glad you’re back,” she says. Her voice is low and soft and careful, the way Mary only gets around family. Cas looks like he’s at least halfway toward totally losing it and bawling in the kitchen.

Cas’ eyes keep flickering toward Dean; he can’t help but thrill at every glance. With one last hard blink, though, Cas turns to Kelly and Jack, still in their strange tableau by the entrance to the kitchen. “I’m sorry. This must be awkward.” God, he’s the same.

“It’s nothing we didn’t expect.” Kelly has a big, genuine, flushed smile, and all of it’s for Cas. It’s stupid for Dean’s pulse to spike in irritation _now_ , but – it does. Shit. Especially when Cas smiles right back, big enough to crinkle the corners of his eyes.

“You should go get Sam,” Jack tells them. Dean bristles, both at taking orders from the Devil’s kid and from – whatever the hell just went on between Cas and Kelly.

“Sure,” he says, anyway, still unable to meet Jack’s eyes. He turns to ask Cas to come with him, but Cas is already following him out of the kitchen without a question. Dean tampers down the thrill that spreads warm through his chest.

“Cas,” Dean asks, when they’re out of earshot of the kitchen, “Are you – how are you? Are you okay?” He barely manages to suppress his own cringe. Hitting his head against the wall would probably be smoother than that question.

“I don’t know.” Cas’ voice cracks with weariness at the seams. “Dean, I _died_. Jack re-forming me wasn’t a – pleasant process. Neither was being trapped in thousands, maybe millions, of other dimensions, unsure of when I’d ever return –”

“Now.” Dean grips Cas, palms on his biceps. The contact feels heady, even through their clothes, even completely platonic. “God, I just – we’re gonna have to – we gotta talk. A lot. I missed you, man. I missed you so much. But you’re here now, and I – I can’t tell you how happy I am for that.”

Another small smile ticks over Cas’ face. There’s an entire world in that smile – more than a world, there are universes. “Believe me, I know,” he says. “I am here. That means a lot.”

Dean lets the moment linger. It swells, the two of them in the hallway, until – “So, you and Kelly – what’d you guys get up to?” Dean gets out, eventually, just to break the tension hunched over them. He could cringe at his tone.

He thinks of the waitress in that diner. Mandy, he thinks it was. Pretty cool chick. Only had eyes for Cas. They could have had fun, and at the time Dean got half a hard-on thinking about Cas’ hands tangling in her hair when she would go down on him, the blissed-out look on his face as he pushed into her. But the same night was the whole Ramiel mess, and Cas was on his back on a dirty barn floor _dying_ , looking right at Dean when he said _I love you_ , and –

Maybe there was no competition from pretty waitresses, Dean had fleetingly thought. But he continued to push Cas toward any and all women who paid him even a moment’s attention; Dean’s been stabbed, tortured, concussed, must’ve snapped every bone in his body at some point, landed in the hospital for days, got ripped to shreds by hellhounds, and yet there’s no one who can hurt him like himself.

“Many things,” Cas says, squinting at Dean like he’s three-quarters of the way to figuring out what, exactly, this strange human means.

“Glad you found yourself a baby mama –”

“It isn’t like that,” Cas says, with a deep solemnity to his voice. “I’m – glad to have another friend in this world. Kelly is a good woman and I’m glad she’s here, too. But we ‘got up to’ nothing.”

“Good to know.” He can’t help the relief that edges its way into his voice.

One of the corners of Cas’ lips pokes up. “Besides,” he adds, “if your last boyfriend was Lucifer, wouldn’t you swear off men for a while too?”

Some other time, when Dean was much more concerned with bravado, he might toss out a _definitely no men to swear off of_ , just to defend his masculinity. He’s realizing now that it ain’t worth it if it means hiding who he is and what he wants, so all he does is laugh. He swings an arm over Cas’ shoulder and draws him closer, the two of them shuffling until they reach Sam’s room.

Before Dean can say anything, Sam catches sight of Cas and scoops both him and Dean up into his arms, pushing the three of them together. The position’s awkward; everyone’s suddenly all elbows and Dean’s face is squished against Sam’s ear. But it’s him and the two people who mean the most to him, his brother who kept him sane and his miracle of a best friend, and that transcends anything.

Like Dean said. Team Free Will. It just took them a few months to get their shit together.

“Jack wanted to see you,” Cas tells Sam, very seriously, once Sam’s released the two of them from his monster death-grip.

“Jack, like –”

“Like Kelly’s son, yes.”

Dean knows Sam better than anyone on the planet, so he knows pretty damn well what it means when that irritated furrow makes its way between Sam’s eyes. He ain’t thrilled. “He’s fine,” Dean assures him. “A little weird, but uh –”

Cas chimes in, “He’s cool.” Dean can practically hear the air quotes around _cool_ when Cas says it, and he turns to him, still smiling.

“Would you really call him cool?”

“Probably not,” Cas concedes. “But he’s – what?” Cas must be distracted by the way Sam keeps looking at the two of them, mirth tinting the expression on his face.

“Oh, nothing,” Sam says, in a tone that implies it is very much something. “I just – Cas, I missed you. Dean did too. I missed this a lot. We really missed you, man.”

“You don’t even know,” Dean chimes in, laughing low, and taking the opportunity to hug him again. If he slides his arms under Cas’ trenchcoat to get closer to his torso, well, the only other person who can see him right now is Sammy. And if he tries to pull any funny business, Dean’s got several lifetimes’ worth of blackmail.

When they get back to the kitchen, Cas shrugs out of his coat, draping it over the back of a chair. And _damn_ , Cas ditched the tax accountant gear. It’s been replaced with a white Henley, thin enough that Dean’s fingers itch to touch it, a blue checkered plaid over it, and jeans. Winchester clothing, Dean doesn’t dare to think, as he feels his brain explode a little bit.

What brings him back to earth are Cas’ sneakers. They’re plain white, pristine, and really dorky. Dad shoes, the kind Jimmy might have worn. They don’t go with the rest of his outfit, and Dean’ll have to get him some real boots, but he grins at them anyway. It’s so _Cas_.

In all the chaos, Dean somehow gets stuck on food duty. Truth be told, he doesn’t actually mind, but he whines to Sammy anyway. “You’re the best cook here, Dean,” Sam grouches, and pushes him away toward the counter. Dean does not preen at that.

But twenty minutes later, he’s whipping up burgers while his mind whirs with absurd paranoia. He knows it’s absurd, but the thoughts froth through his brain. These burgers have gotta be perfect, or else – this all really will be too good to be true. He can see it: Cas gone again, Mom gone again, Lucifer back in business, the whole world on fire, all because he didn’t cook the burgers right. Frantic, Dean looks around the counter. If only he had –

“Here you go,” Jack says, and Dean absolutely does not jump half a foot into the air at the intrusion. Jack’s lucky Dean didn’t have a knife or his gun, not that he could actually hurt the kid. One of those flimsy plastic bags for produce from the supermarket swings from Jack’s hand, and yup, it’s full of jalapeño peppers.

“Good rule of thumb: don’t surprise a hunter like that,” Dean tells him, once his breathing’s returned to normal. His heart rate never really slows down around the kid. “And thanks.”

Jack smiles, big and sunny. “I hope you know I really care about Cas,” he says. “My biological father… I didn’t know him, but I could sense nothing in him was good. I was sad about it for a while, that I came from someone so wicked. But I had my mom. She’s good. And then I met Cas – well, not really met, not at first, I was still growing inside my mom. But he’s good too. He’s always going to be who I think of as my dad. And I’m grateful for that. You’re lucky he’s been such a big part of your life.”

Emotions flicker through Dean. Annoyance. Confusion. But in the end, God, Jack’s managed to _endear_ himself to Dean. Powerful as he is, he’s just another wayward soul in this world, looking to dudes just as lost as he is for the way to live.

Dean smiles. It’s tight but genuine. “You’re right. I am. And – you’re right. Cas, your mom, they’re really good people. You’re lucky to have them. _We_ are.”

Jack offers him up another sunny smile, then steps away. It’s so he can hover around his mom again, but maybe he’s learning how to behave halfway normal.

Twenty minutes later, Dean’s serving dinner for everyone. He even threw together a salad for Jack, ‘cuz kid’s gotta eat healthy, and Sam, ‘cuz he’s just a weirdo. Kelly shoots him a grateful look at the salad, but it’s nothing compared to the way Cas’ eyes go _liquid_ when he catches sight of the jalapeños studding the top of his burger.

Sam catches Cas looking at his burger, which, _great_. But after a flicker of a smirk, Sam just looks – happy. Really happy. What the hell?

Dean doesn’t know where to begin the conversation. “So, uh, where did you guys go?”

“Everywhere.” Jack takes a big bite of his salad, nonchalant. “A couple of thousand universes? Cas can probably describe it better than I can.” He talks with his mouth full. “Did you show him who’s in the basement yet?”

Five pairs of eyes rotate to focus on Dean. He really hates that. “Uh –”

“This really is delicious, thank you,” Jack continues, oblivious.

“You did _tell_ him who we have down there, right?” Sam asks, putting his fork down. When Dean doesn’t answer, Sam puts on one of his more constipated-looking bitchfaces. “You’ve only been having heart-to-hearts with _his clone_ for as long as he’s been gone, Dean.”

Cas whips his head toward Dean’s in obvious alarm. “You – what?”

“Lucifer’s dead.” Mary’s voice cuts through the discussion. Dean hazards a glance at Jack, but the kid’s barely reacting, still chowing down on that friggin’ salad. “Lucifer’s dead, because – after you – at the lake house – I attacked him. And the two of us, we ended up trapped in that other dimension.”

Cas has a wary look stamped on his face. But he keeps watching Mary talk. Keeps listening.

“I – after I killed Lucifer, I didn’t know what to do. So I did the only thing I could keep of. I kept fighting. I made it to Heaven in that other dimension, and I made an exchange. Lucifer’s head, for – you. Or the version of you from the other dimension.”

Very carefully, Cas places his knife back on the plate. He’s quiet about it, so it doesn’t shatter the quiet in the room like a drop would, but it still sounds loud in the silence. “You knew it wasn’t me.”

“Of course. But it was the only shot we had, I thought. It was – I don’t know if it helped Sam or Dean –”

“It helped,” Dean says. He’s surprised how automatically the words come out. He can feel Cas turn his gaze to him, still wary, and Dean – also automatically, he reaches down and touches Cas’ hand. He moves, until he’s touching Cas’ palm. He’ll think about _that_ reaction later.

“But I thought it would be good to see a friendly face. That’s all.”

Cas takes a minute to respond, in which Sam and Dean and Mary are entirely silent, Jack chews loudly, and Kelly frantically moves her head back and forth from her son to the rest of the table. Seriously, Dean’s had some fucking _awkward_ family dinners, but this one takes the cake.

“I didn’t think you all valued me so much,” Cas admits at last, and that Cas’ first reaction was _that_ – Dean’s sorry he dropped his hand so he can’t squeeze Cas’ again. “And when I ended up on the other side of the rift, in a destroyed land where I knew no one, it was a comfort to see Bobby Singer there, even if he wasn’t the Bobby I knew. So – I do understand.”

Dean picks up the conversation before the silence can settle too heavily again. “When Mom got back, we, uh. Kept the other Castiel in the dungeon. Didn’t know what else to do. We’ve been… talking to him, trying to get him to tell us anything.” Dean can sense Mary and Sam’s glances at him at the words _we_ and _us_ , but – he’s going to deal with this later. He’ll deal with all of this later. “He’s no Sunshine Sally, but like I said. In his way, he helped.”

“I’d like to see him.” Cas says it so decisively that Dean has to fight the double-take.

Sam’s the first to reply. “Of course.” Then, with just a hint of a smirk, he turns to Dean and declares, “Dean was definitely closest to the guy. You two go together.”

Dean nods, and gets up from his seat along with Cas. As the two of them leave the room, he catches a glimpse of just how amused Kelly, of all people, looks. Again, _what the hell?_

The walk to the dungeon ain’t long, but it feels like an eternity. A very quiet eternity.

“Cas, he, uh, he wasn’t you,” Dean says when they’re outside the door to the dungeon. All Dean has to do is push it open, but he finds he can’t, not yet. “Sometimes, just talking to him, it helped, but – he wasn’t you. Sure as hell didn’t act like you. Not even when I first met you, and you had a pretty big stick up your ass then.” He lets himself laugh, before speaking seriously again. “You gotta know that, man.”

The expression on Cas’ face is infuriatingly inscrutable. “I know,” is all he says. “Trust me. I understand.”

Cas pushes open the door, leaving Dean scrambling to follow, and takes in the image of himself.

Cas does a blatant double-take, which would be funny if the situation wasn’t so fraught. Double angel grace electrifies the room, but Dean ain’t sure if that’s a stronger force than the tension whizzing between the three of them. Cas’ eyes up arc and over, tracing Castiel’s back, and of course. His wings.

Castiel doesn’t react at first. Once Cas starts looking at his wings, though, he grimaces. All these months together, all these conversations like teeth torn out, and Dean still can’t figure out the guy at all.

“You must be… me.” Cas is the first to speak. “From the other universe.”

“There are more than two universes,” Castiel says, plainly.

“I’m very aware, I just spent several months –”

“– and _you_ must be a fallen angel.”

Cas falls silent at that. He keeps his lips pursed and looks everywhere but at Castiel’s face, or Dean. Dean’s halfway to panicking when Cas shoots back, “I don’t know if I’d consider myself fallen. I’ll never be human. But I don’t belong to Heaven, not any more.” For a minute, he says nothing. Then, he looks over at Dean, just a flicker, short enough that Dean thinks maybe he imagined it. “I’m not sure I ever did.”

Castiel shoots Cas a harsh glance, and look, Dean’s had some – illuminating conversations with the guy. No argument about that. But he can’t help the hackles that rise up in him the second Castiel looks at Cas like that. Castiel isn’t hostile, though, when he says, “I’m not sure I’ll ever understand, though the argument’s gotten more tempting lately.”

Dean wonders what the hell kind of argument they’re talking about while the two Castiels size each other up with twin blue glares. Neither looks like they’re an immediate threat to the other, but Dean’s also pretty sure they’re not gonna start holding hands and singing Kumbaya together either. Stuck in a stalemate.

“Uh, guys –” he starts to say, but he falls silent when the two of them turn their eyes to him. It’s – intimidating. And kind of uncomfortably hot, which he really does not want to think about at this particularly inopportune moment.

Cas shakes his head, fast and decisive. “I’m not surprised. This – this would be easier if I was able to –”

That’s when he moves forward, sharply. Dean takes a desperate lunge, because he saw Cas’ murder face when the guy started moving, and he really does not want him to kill Castiel. He’s still kinda confused about the guy, but he’s a solid ninety-five percent sure he’s not evil, and the idea of anything with that face dying in front of him makes his guts jump unhappily.

The lunge doesn’t matter. Cas outpaces him anyway, and stands up right next to Castiel, seizing his copy by the forearms in a vice grip. Panic ticks up in Dean’s heartbeat, radiating out through his entire body.

What happens next – nothing could have prepared Dean for it.

Almost clinically, Cas’ hands move. They search Castiel’s face, running over it from forehead to chin. Then, grasping him tighter, Cas meets Castiel in the middle, until they’re fucking _kissing_.

“What the –” Dean starts, lurching toward them as quickly as he can, but he backs off when white-blue mist rises, dances between the two of them, and whisks itself away as quickly as it came. The room’s boiling hot and freezing cold at once, something like static electricity fizzling along his skin before it sinks into his bones. There’s no pain, at least, and he rides the wave of it, pliant enough to take himself by surprise.

All the while, Cas stays attached to Castiel. His touch is entirely clinical but God, their mouths won’t stop touching, moving around each other. It’s definitely the weirdest thing that’s ever given Dean half a boner, that’s for sure.

Slowly, as if the energy itself knows enough to be careful, the static electricity withdraws. The temperature returns to normal. With a loud wet smack that truly does not help Dean’s pants situation, Cas pulls away from Castiel.

When Dean can finally bring himself to look at them, he finds himself meeting two matching sets of deep blue stares yet again. The hostility’s gone, at least, but now they both just look _lost_. He wonders what the hell he’s supposed to _say_ to what he just saw, when –

“Oh. I was wrong. I do understand,” Castiel says, at last. His voice has a hazy quality that Dean has never heard from him before.

The three of them are in the kitchen between one heartbeat and the next. Mary jumps up from her chair, throwing herself bodily in front of Sam. In the middle of a metric fuckton of conflicting and wildly baffling emotions, Dean still gets choked up at that.

“You – did you escape –”

“He could have escaped any time,” Cas says, calm. _Cas_ says it, which means he must _know_ somehow.

“I don’t mean any harm. Really,” Castiel insists. His voice is flat and his body language is the same as ever, stiff and upright. It doesn’t really give off the vibe of a dude who means no harm.

“He’s telling the truth,” Jack chimes in.

Castiel nods at him. Dean is not super cool with the idea of an angel soldier who only ever knew war and destruction being friendly with the most powerful being in their universe, but for once, he bites his tongue. “I just want to go home.”

There’s no emotion in his voice. But Dean, well – Dean can relate.

 

 

*****

 

They could’ve gotten Jack to zap them to Castiel’s destination, but that would’ve too easy. Or Castiel himself could’ve taken them, but Dean said hell no to that; the Cas Express was tricky enough to ride, he’d declared, and dealt with Sam’s mockery for a good five minutes because, you know what? He’d totally deserved it. Really needed to watch his phrasing.

Point is, they end up driving there. Jack and Kelly stay behind, Kelly promising she’ll find somewhere to stay nearby that’s not the bunker despite Sam and Dean’s offers to let her stay as long as she wants. The rest of them all crowd into the Impala and take off for a couple of days.

Saying space is limited inside Baby is an understatement. Tension winds its way through the car, but it’s got nothing to do with how they all keep their legs and shoulders squeezed so they can all fit. Dean and Sam and Mary, they all take turns driving, grumbling about said driving, and sleeping. No one talks much, least of all Cas, no matter how many times Dean casts long looks in the rearview mirror toward him.

“It’s very beautiful here,” is the most Castiel ever says on the drive. Dean never got the sense he appreciated much of anything, so the words are kind of a shock. But he just keeps rollin’ on, same as ever.

A couple of days later, when they’re maybe an hour outside of Madison, Castiel picks his head up from where it’s been resting against the window, and tells them to stop.

Their surroundings aren’t too notable. Big bushy pine trees crowd in on the road at all sides, thickening out even further as you go farther down into the woods; the road’s looked pretty similar to this for hours. Not anything Dean hasn’t seen a hundred, a thousand, times out here on the road, but still beautiful against a slate-gray sky that promises rain.

Castiel takes a few steps beyond the wood’s edge, and then looks back at the four of them. They’re all clumped together by the car, weapons drawn. Sam’s got Ruby’s knife, Cas holds out his blade, and Dean and Mary brandish guns. They’re like some dumbass paranoid version of the Avengers here to attack the woods.

Other than a quick sweep with his eyes, Castiel doesn’t comment. He just gestures, a quick and bird-like swoop, for them to follow him.

“Do you think this is a good idea?” Sam mutters.

“Probably not, but neither was, you know, talking to the guy in the first place.” Dean keeps walking, willing himself not to crunch too many branches underfoot. The density of the woods jams them close together, and Dean tries to ignore how close Cas is; he can feel the brush of the trenchcoat against his calves.

After ten minutes of walking, Dean’s about ready to start complaining – not _whining_ , thank you – that he should’ve brought a real jacket along. That’s when the woods thin out abruptly, stopping the words in his throat.

There are no trees in the wide clearing, but the grass sprouts tall enough that it brushes past Dean’s ankles. Reaching up from the grass, like a particularly long stem, is another tear in the universe, humming yellow. If Dean focuses enough, he can see the charred ground beyond it.

He doesn’t know what he’s expecting out of Castiel. But a speech ain’t it. So of course, right before he reaches the portal, he turns around and starts addressing them.

“It’s time for me to go back,” he says. “I really did enjoy it here, most of the time. Before you say anything, I know you don’t believe that, but I have no reason to lie.” The way he meets Dean’s eye – not quite a glare but not quite the way _Cas_ does – will never stop making Dean’s stomach flip over a couple of times. “But this still isn’t my world.”

Dean starts thinking of what the hell he could possibly say to Castiel, who still feels like a stranger even after months of spilling his damn guts in front of him, when his mom steps forward. “God knows I know that feeling,” she tells him. It’s more than a little awkward when she clutches at Castiel’s hands, but Dean can brush it off out of gratitude that she stepped up.

“What are you gonna do?” Dean asks. He immediately wants to kick himself for doing so, but the question’s out there.

“The world I knew, it wasn’t a world at all,” Castiel says, by way of an answer. “It was a world of constant war, constant death, fear and blood. The other angels, I thought they were my family, but we were ruled by terror as much as anyone. The humans – I can’t even imagine.”

“It sucked,” Mary adds. She’s still standing close to him. A smile flickers off her face almost as quickly as it appeared, but it was there, however briefly.

Castiel continues, “This world, your world. It taught me – other emotions. I’ve seen anger, yes, but the kind that comes from caring too much. Fear of _loss_ , not just panic that you won’t last another day. Understanding. Loyalty beyond what I knew. Forgiveness, something I could never contemplate until it was right in front of me.” His spine straightens, just a notch or two, but enough that Dean notices. The guy’s idiosyncrasies, they’re a part of his life now. “I’ve seen love.”

There is one hell of an awkward pause after that one.

“I’m going to make things better where I came from. I’m going to make things _right_. It might be impossible. But I’ve seen – and heard – some remarkable things.” Castiel flicks his eyes between Dean and Cas after his last sentence. This time around, Dean manages to keep eye contact. He figures he owes Castiel that much.

Castiel smiles. The guy actually smiles.

Then, he puts his hand on the shining yellow tear. Light, blinding like grace, swallows up his entire body until it turns into a beacon, bright enough to see from the road. Dean has to shield his eyes, but the light screams loud enough he sees it behind his eyelids. There’s a flash, and it’s enough to make him stagger backwards.

After a few seconds of blissful darkness, he cracks one cautious eye open. The clearing is back to normal. No split in the universe. No Castiel.

Dean takes a few careful steps forward. “Thanks,” he says at last, to the quiet woods, hoping the winds can pick his words up and carry them an impossible distance.

“Yeah.” Mary’s standing beside him.

“Yes.” Dean turns around, because Cas of all people said that. When Dean meets his eyes, Cas holds his gaze in balance for a few seconds, only to turn away and start walking through the woods back to the car.

The ride back to the bunker is just as quiet as the way there, and somehow even more tense. Dean knows the good kind of tension with Cas, but this ain’t it. Things had been easy and great when he first showed up, but the second they hit the dungeon and Castiel got involved, it got – weird. The kissing, and how easily Cas had gone along with Castiel’s plan without saying a word to Dean, and now his silence.

It’s what led to the whole mess of the last few months, so of course Dean can’t help but think of the night Cas came back from Heaven, the one where he stole the Colt. How pathetically hopeful Dean had been about the whole thing, how welcoming, only to have Cas use him and run out on him. Three goddamn times, right in succession. He almost stole _Baby_ ; he let an archdemon melt the Colt; he left them alone and unguarded by the entrance to Heaven. And then he’d finally found Cas again in that little house in Washington state, only to –

Yeah. He’s not going down that path again. Cas is back, Cas is back, Cas is back, he tells himself. Cas is _here_. But for how goddamn long?

God, he can’t get that kiss out of his head.

His fingers go _rat-a-tat_ on the steering wheel, an obviously irritated rhythm. No one reacts, other than to cast him a couple of sidelong looks. Cas meets his eyes in the rearview mirror, but Dean wrenches his gaze away.

When they get back to the bunker, Sam and Mary practically bolt back to their rooms. Kelly was true to her word; she and Jack are nowhere to be found. Means it’s just him and Cas. Great.

Dean kicks the leg of one of the chairs in the war room, then settles into it. He hopes Cas will just – get it over with and leave now. Cas sticks around, though, the colors of his plaid shirt (red today) bright in Dean’s peripheral vision. All it does is remind Dean that it could be like this, just like this, always, but – it won’t be. The two of them, it can’t be.

Cas settles in the chair next to Dean’s. He turns so he’s facing him. Dean doesn’t meet his eyes.

“Are you going to miss him?” Cas asks Dean, after a few moments of silence.

Dean doesn’t know what he was expecting, with the tension in the room practically hissing around them, but it sure as hell wasn’t that. “I – I dunno,” he responds. “We talked a lot.”

“I’m aware,” Cas says, in a tone that’s just bitter enough that Dean finally looks up. His pulse digs a corkscrew into his neck.

“Yeah, you know _why_ we talked, right?”

Cas sits at the table and tents his hands. He’s so placid, and it makes something ugly spike in Dean. “Your mother brought an angel from another dimension, one notably different from your own,” he says, with a wary undertone. “Of course you were interested.”

“Bullshit, Cas,” Dean spits out. Cas blinks hard at that, and his head jerks back just a few degrees. Good. “I talked to him because I was trying anything I could to get my _best friend_ back. I was at the end of my goddamn rope. But it turns out he was joyridin’ around in twenty dimensions at once with the devil’s kid. So I’m just thinking, why the hell did I bother, you know?”

“Dean, he revived me and then I was gone –”

“You couldn’t have tried to come back?” Dean shoots back. “Use your words, man. I’ve – uh, me and Sam and Mom, we were worried for _months_.”

Cas glares right back at him and Dean tries not to think about how badly he missed it. “I did everything I could, Dean. Would you have wanted me to leave Jack alone?”

“He had his mom –”

“His mother, who does not have an angel’s power,” Cas snaps.

Dean knows Cas is right on that front. He also knows it was unfair to dump all the responsibility for Jack on Kelly. But right now, anger and irrationality are winning the day. “You got lucky, Cas,” Dean says, trying to keep his voice steady even as his pulse beats at his skull so hard he can feel a headache coming on. “If Jack turned out like his dad, it wouldn’t _matter_ who his mom was. Your powers wouldn’t matter either.”

He really shouldn’t have mentioned Jack’s dad and Cas so closely together. The headache full-on blooms.

“You’re just proving my point, Dean,” Cas says, thankfully disrupting Dean’s thoughts, “I had to make sure Jack turned out all right –”

“Yeah, you just _had_ to stay away all those months. Were you even yourself, man? I saw your eyes go yellow back when you zapped Dagon. Something with yellow eyes only fucked up _this entire family_ , in case you missed it. And with our history, sorry if I have some _issues_ with possession.”

Cas glances away. After a long while, Dean stands up. “Gonna get some shut-eye, that drive sucked,” he snarls. There’s a sour taste under his tongue; his heart slithers out of place. His footprints are heavy as he increases the distance between him and Cas, and every one of them fires a message of _wrong wrong wrong_ , step by step.

He screws his eyes shut. He stops walking.

He can’t do this again. If he doesn’t face up to what they’ve got laced between them, he’ll do nothing but walk away angry from Cas the rest of his life. “Cas –” he starts, with no idea what the destination will be.

“Will you let me speak?” Cas asks, Dean’s back still to him.

Dean doesn’t answer. The fuckin’ irony of Cas asking him for a talk, after everything. He does grunt, though, and he figures Cas will take it as a yes.

Cas doesn’t take too long to start talking. “When I – when Jack powered me up against Dagon, I lost myself. You’re right, it was dangerous. His power is beyond anything in this dimension, and he couldn’t control those powers at the time. I could have been lost, Dean. But you were hurt. That’s how I held on to what I am. I thought of you.”

Dean turns around. If Dean didn’t know Cas so well, he’d say his expression was entirely blank. But there’s a desperation turning his eyes the shade of a choppy, stormy sea, widening his pupils by a fraction.

Dean steps closer.

“I thought I had to stay with Jack for the greater good –” Dean must pull a face at that, because Cas just glowers harder, and his voice drops down half an octave. “I hurt you. I know that. And I’m _sorry_ , Dean. The greater good, I can’t win it on my own.” He purses his lips and looks away. “What I’m trying to tell you is – I want to face it with you. Otherwise I’m done with it. I played with fire these past few years, and I finally got burned.”

“Hey –”

“But worse than that, it kept me away from you, Dean. From you and Sam, and the other people here I care for. You’re the one who makes that greater good worth it. I’ll never – I can’t stop thinking of myself as the one who keeps you safe. But maybe that’s unfair to you. To both of us. Maybe it’s time I started facing things together with you.”

Dean feels like he’s been on the receiving end of a lot of Cas’ monologues this year. Every single one of them made his head swim, grabbed at his breath and stole it away. _I love you_ still echoes in his head. In Dean’s more shameful moments, he dares to think that maybe Cas was addressing just one of them before he spoke to all of them.

Still, it was easy to brush the sentiment off as familial. Especially with Sam and Mom there. They were the buffer that meant Dean didn’t have to explore his feelings too deeply, didn’t have to put anything on the line just to inevitably lose it. Just to inevitably get his heart broken for caring. For needing, for wanting.

This is something different. It’s just him and Cas now. Alone, and together.

Dean’s been angry at Cas before. Hell, he was angry two minutes ago. The guy could’ve broken the world with the Leviathan shit, and worse, he shattered Sam’s wall just because it was convenient for his plan. And all the shit with the Colt, and chasing after Kelly – Dean’s been furious.

It’s just most of the time, that anger goes hand-in-hand with caring. With worry. The last couple of years, when Dean’s gotten mad at Cas, it’s because losing him forever – it had been agonizingly close.

Trying to push those thoughts out of his mind and steady himself again, Dean says, “Why, Cas, I didn’t know you cared.” There’s sarcasm in his voice, but no real heat behind it any more.

Cas stands up and takes a few steps toward Dean, until they’re too close but he can hardly care. “I know you chronically brush off emotional moments with humor, but never doubt that I do,” Cas says fiercely, still thrumming from their argument, breathing in the same space as Dean. A sapling smile, little more than just a suggestion, starts worming its way into the corner of Cas’ mouth. “I’m old, and I’m tired. And I’m tired of fighting with you.”

“Me too,” Dean says, and swallows hard at that. “Me too.”

At his words, he practically jumps forward to wrap Cas up in his arms. Cas doesn’t even hesitate before he’s hugging Dean right back. They must look so pathetic, Dean thinks, rocking back and forth right there in the war room, the big table and the telescope just a few steps away, but he doesn’t care.

Cas is warm in Dean’s arms, with the kind of warmth that reminds him that Cas isn’t really of this world. Or maybe it’s the kind of warmth that you can only feel around someone who – means what Cas does to him.

“I want to apologize.” Cas is talking right into the side of Dean’s head. God, his lips are so close to Dean’s temple. If Dean turns his head only a little bit, they could be – “I wanted to be useful. For you. For the world. For everyone I’d ever failed. Like if I could do this one thing, this one good thing, it would make up for all the harm I’d done.”

“I know the feeling, buddy. Trust me, if anyone does –” Dean pulls back, not to get away from Cas, but just so he can see him while he’s still at arm’s length. “But if you wanna consider this an official announcement, go ahead. You don’t need to do anything to _make it up_ to me. Or Sam. Or Mom. You wanna help the world, go ahead, but you saved it at least as many times as you messed it up. Think that makes you square.”

Cas’ eyes are shinier than Dean’s ever seen them before. “Will you take your own advice?”

“Never.” He laughs, not too bitter, and sits them both down again. “But let me know about the crazy plans, alright? I ain’t a damsel in distress. And believe me, I know you can handle it. I just don’t want you goin’ it alone.”

Cas ducks his head. “I think it all comes back to – peace or freedom. I asked you that, Dean. So long ago.”

Dean lets out a chuckle at that. “The first apocalypse.” Cas’ eyes seem to go unfocused at that, even as he keeps running his fingers over Dean’s arms and up his shoulders. “Hey, man, you can’t – it’s water under the bridge, I swear. We ended up okay, and when Lucifer – when I saw you –”

Dean had always wondered how Cas managed to forgive him for everything. But then he realizes how fragile one human life must seem to a creature from eternity, and he might start to understand.

Cas keeps his palms over Dean’s forearms. Even through Dean’s flannel, he’s so warm. “I’m not you, Dean. I never – I didn’t have the courage to choose freedom. When Jack showed me the perfect future, it was you, happy with your family. And I was –”

“What about you, Cas?”

Finally, Cas shifts. “I was – irrelevant.”

“Bullshit,” Dean exhales. “I don’t want a life without you in it. You _are_ my family. If you’re not there? That’s not a perfect future. I’ll take the mess because I’ll take _you_.”

Cas manages a smile at that. Small, and sad, but there. “I knew peace, the satisfaction that what I thought was _right_ , for millennia, Dean, before I met you. Since I rescued you, Dean, I’ve felt much more doubt.”

As if anticipating Dean’s reaction, Cas reaches in and skims the rise of Dean’s cheekbone with his fingers. Dean would rather chow down on crocotta burgers than call anything intimate, but – that’s the closest word to what this is. They’re in public territory in the bunker, and Sam or Mary could walk in at any moment.

Dean doesn’t care. Cas’ fingers against his cheek have stolen his breath and any humiliation he might have. He’s had sex countless times, he’s pretty damn sure he loved Cassie and Lisa, and he’s been falling for Cas for years now. Nothing has ever made his heart tick the way that touch does.

“Cas –” Dean starts.

Cas’ fingers stroke his cheek, once, then drop. “It’s a part of life, Dean. I’m living now. It’s freedom. It’s wonderful.” His legs shift. “I will admit I hope nothing apocalyptic happens any time soon, though. I think we’ve had enough of that for several lifetimes. Crowley sealed Hell before his death.”

“Finally, something useful.”

Cas raises his eyebrows, a very _you said it, not me_ gesture. Weird as it is, Dean knows they both have some shit to sort through when it comes to Crowley, but it can wait. “And Joshua’s decoy plan worked remarkably well, but Heaven’s sealed up behind him. It was powerful magic, and I didn’t get Kelly and her unborn child in on time –” He looks away at that.

“Hey. Turned out all right.”

Dean can tell Cas wants to argue against what he’s saying. But he just catches his eyes and keeps staring, so that’s something.

“Until anything bigger pops up, I could – maybe I could help you hunt. I know I sucked at it –”

“You didn’t suck.”

“Keep saying that.” It’s a goddamn fraught situation. But Cas is smiling, so it must be okay.

“Oh I will.”

Cas leans back and props his chin in his palm. It’s a very human gesture. “I’d like to help in the field, but I also have plenty of knowledge that might help you and other hunters. I’ll set up base somewhere nearby, and –”

“Cas.” Dean levels a look at him. “ _Nearby_ , what the hell. This is your home.” An unreadable expression flickers over Cas’ face; Dean’s heart practically slumps at the look. Of course, of course. That was so fucking presumptuous of him. “I mean – I – if you want it to be. You can go off on your own, or uh, I’m sure Heaven wants to see you –”

“I’m not going back to Heaven,” Cas says. Considering that the words tilt Dean off his axis, and must have even more significance for Cas, he speaks them impressively calmly. “If the angels want my help again, in order to _deal with_ Jack, they can – what’s the term – _fuck off_.”

If Dean was drinking something, he’s pretty sure he’d spew it everywhere at those last two words. “Damn, Cas,” he says, and he feels the affection warming his words, “I didn’t think you had it in you.”

Cas manages a smile back at him, but Dean can tell it’s tinged with something sadder and darker. On instinct, he scoots his chair closer, wraps his fingers around Cas’ shoulder. There’s a humming that picks up across Dean’s skin where they touch, and he’s not sure if that’s an angel thing or just a _Cas_ thing.

“In a way, they’ll never stop being my family,” Cas starts, after a long silence. “But I can never make up what I did to them. I’m tired of good soldiers who never got the chance to live dying for me and my mistakes. I’m not happy about this. But it’s better this way.”

“They can never make up for what they did to you, either.” They’re leaning so close Dean can practically feel Cas’ breath on his face. “I hope you know that.”

Cas doesn’t respond, and Dean figures he doesn’t agree. But it’s better than another argument. “So I can stay?” he asks, at last. His voice sounds – small, diminished somehow, and Dean hates himself a lot for ever making Cas sound that way.

“Yeah. Yeah, of course. This was – it was always your home. The bullshit with Gadreel, God. I can’t ever do enough to make you feel welcome here after that. It’s been years, and all I can think is that it’s a goddamn miracle Sam forgave me at all. And you too. But the least I can do after that is be honest with the people who – who mean that much to me. So yeah, Cas, this is home, if you want it.”

“I do.”

“Good.” Dean feels a grin lift over his face. “I want you to stay, too.”

Gravity always hangs over Cas’ face. The dude looks exhausted way too often, especially for someone who doesn’t need sleep. It’s probably dealing with Dean’s bullshit that marks the deep indigo circles under his eyes. But at those words, Dean could swear, something lighter passes over his face. Dean won’t think about it too much. Hope is a deadly thing; he’s gotta be projecting.

Cas follows him down the hallway, back to Room 15. Dean can’t help the nerves jumping around in his stomach as he opens the door for him, but – it’s different this time. Cas can meet his eyes when they talk; hell, the dude has a hard time tearing his gaze away.

There’s nothing on the room’s walls, and they’re such a dull gray Dean doesn’t even feel justified calling them hospital-level sterile. He wants to toss a colorful rug or thirteen on the floor. Cas still looks downright overcome as he takes slow step after slow step into the room. His room.

“Dean?”

“Yeah?”

Cas smiles. His lips are still closed, but it’s enough to make the corners of his eyes crinkle, enough to lighten his face until he looks like the human he isn’t. He sits on the bed, and God, the need to join him in it, get them both naked, and roll him over until he’s blanketed Dean is too, too tempting. “I’m glad you asked me to stay. I might need my space sometimes, but – I can let you know. I can be better at that, much better, I know. I’ll answer my phone. And I’ll come back.”

Dean smiles. It’s not exactly a dazzler of a smile, but it’s real. The idea of Cas striking out on his own, driving all over the Midwest in his awful Continental or the weirdly sexy pickup truck, no longer fills him with dread. Maybe he shouldn’t trust him, shouldn’t trust that he’ll be back, but that’s what love goddamn _is_. “Together,” is all Dean says. “If you meant it, I do too.”

“Of course I did.” Cas says it with the confidence, and the relief, of figuring out the last clue on a hunt, the one that meant Dean could finally go kill the son of a bitch that was hurting people. “Goodnight, Dean.”

“Goodnight.”

He closes the door most of the way, but leaves it just a crack open. A beam of light cuts sharp into the darkness of the hallway. Dean keeps his eye on it as he walks away.

 

 

*****

 

Despite what Dean said to Cas, it’s not a good night. Not at first, anyway.

After the drive, the argument, and the frankly embarrassing if very needed emotional upheaval, Dean figures he’d be exhausted. And he feels it at first. His boots are heavy like someone stuffed ‘em full of cement, and he just tosses them across the room as opposed to neatly placing them against the side of his bed. He shucks his jeans and lies back in bed in his boxers, t-shirt, and flannel, not even caring about the way the buttons on the last one dig into his skin when he turns the wrong way.

The memory foam’s so inviting. His sheets, warm against the constant chill of the bunker. The pillow cradles his head.

There’s just one problem. He might be exhausted, but he can’t sleep.

Not like Dean’s a stranger to insomnia, the hours melting by him as he stares at dark walls. He’s been possessed by dull worry and far sharper panic. He hasn’t wanted to face his nightmares. He’d been in Hell, and hadn’t needed sleep. He’d had some apocalyptic baddie breathing down his neck, or evil’s little tramp stamp burnt into his arm. And sometimes, it’d been as simple as Sam snoring loud enough to bring the fuckin’ house down in the other motel bed.

What Dean feels now, it’s none of those. It’s every part of him crying out for the need to touch. The only thing that can rock him to sleep, he knows, is skin on skin. He’s fucked himself into exhaustion a few dozen times when he was lonely on the road, sure, but this doesn’t even need to be any kind of sexy touching, and it definitely shouldn’t be with the bartender of the night. Palm to palm with Cas would do it.

He squeezes his temples. God, he’s gotten embarrassing.

It’s been maybe an hour of staring into the blank blackness of his room when Dean gets out of bed. Sleep ain’t coming, not without – well. If they’re really doing this _together_ , he might as well start now.

He’s thinking of the quickest way to get to Room 15 when he flings the door open. There’s Cas on the other side. Dean inhales sharply and feels his eyes go wide, but recovers.

“Workin’ up the courage to knock?”

Cas has a grouchy face on, which absolutely means he’s been called out. Life’s pretty funny when it makes Heaven’s most feared warrior afraid to knock on his best friend’s door. “I didn’t want to wake you up.”

“Wasn’t sleeping much.” A grin zips over Dean’s face.

Cas has changed clothes again. Now he’s wearing a plain gray t-shirt, the kind Dean buys on Wal-Mart runs in an eight-pack, and plaid pajama pants. The sight of someone like Cas, a creature Dean can barely comprehend, an otherworldly thing of light and shattering screams and war, brought low to an underground bunker to wear his old PJs all frayed at the bottom – it sort of breaks Dean’s heart.

It also feels like everything Dean’s ever wanted. He doesn’t dwell on that too much.

“You couldn’t sleep either?” Dean asks. Cas grouches out a _yes_ and slips past him into Dean’s room. Dean clicks on the light; he’s gotta see him. “What’s up?”

Dean’s heart thumps, jackrabbit fast. He tries very very hard not to wonder if Cas is wearing boxers underneath his PJs, or if it’s just skin all the way.

His beating heart, the thoughts that get him hot under the collar – Dean is so human. He’ll be humanity’s advocate in the face of evil itself, tell God off to his face, but he didn’t just shatter this beautiful statue, he wrestled him down into the muck along with him. For the ten millionth time, he wonders what the hell Cas even wants to do with him anyway.

Then Cas walks to the middle of Dean’s room on socked feet, and scratches his head. All of it’s impossibly human, too. Dean’ll – he’ll take it as a sign.

“I spent what felt like years without you, when Jack took me away,” Cas says, carefully letting himself into the chair in the corner of the room. It creaks under Cas’ weight; the noise sounds well-worn, like home. “Decades. I was miserable, but – on the small chance I ever returned, I prepared for a world without you. It was what I deserved for all the times I didn’t stick around.”

“C’mon, man. That’s at least equally my fault.”

Cas shoots him a look that isn’t quite a glare, but is enough to make Dean stop talking. “But I’m back, and you’re here. I was shocked at how good it felt to hug you. Touch you.” A strawberry flush colors his cheekbones, even through the potent expression that remains on his face. “I’ve spent months in Heaven, or looking for God alone – apart from you, is my point. Imagine how I felt when I realized I just couldn’t do it any more.”

“Room felt kind of empty?” Dean asks, realization hitting him hard.

“Yes.”

Dean sits back on his bed. Cas watches him sink down on it, his gaze obvious, eyes practically drawing an outline around the shape of his body, then moving over to the empty space next to him. “Yeah, kind of always been the one thing that sucks about this place,” Dean says with a wide gesture. “The nights get lonely.”

“I think I see a solution that could work.” Cas’ hands are clasped in front of him. He’s smiling, soft. This is a crazy dream, some dumbass romantic fantasy, made real. That’s the only possible explanation.

“Me too. C’mere.” Dean slides into the bed and stretches his legs out. Then, he holds the corner of the sheet up and uses his spare hand to pat the other side of the bed.

A couple of hours ago, Cas didn’t even think he was welcome in the bunker, and Dean was too furious to even look straight at the guy. Things are going rollercoaster fast now. Only with Cas at his side, the speed ain’t the lurches and spine-thudding jolts of a rollercoaster. It’s more like Baby on the highway on a good day, no traffic and the windows cranked down, Zepp blaring from the tape deck.

Cas is still staring at him, and there’s a horrible second where Dean wonders if he has read every single goddamn thing wrong –

But then Cas comes to the bed, movements more disjointed than Dean’s but smooth enough to get him under the covers with the blanket pulled over him. They’re face to face now, what can’t be more than a foot away.

Dean bends his knee so it touches Cas’. First point of contact, one that sends firework shivers through Dean’s nervous system. Cas’ eyes are satisfyingly dark, too.

“Dude, you said it’s about the touch,” Dean says, and he’s being selfish enough to admit it’s as much for himself as it is Cas. “You can touch me.”

Cas’ hands are everywhere then. Well, nowhere Dean would normally call interesting. But his fingertips map out a new path across Dean’s body, turning his skin into the sweetest song as he goes.

Those fingertips, they map the backs of his knees, moving up to cup as much of Dean’s hips as they can over his clothes. Over his gut, high enough that it could pass for clinical. They work their way into Dean’s armpits, which is fucking weird, but then again, angel, and Dean’s so blissed out it feels as good as anything else. They skim down the bridge of his nose and over his cheekbones and when Cas’ fingers reach Dean’s forehead, it’s familiar enough to feel like a benediction.

He pauses there, and Dean takes the opportunity. Edging his way in closer, he hugs Cas around the middle. “Feel like an octopus,” he grunts against Cas’ shoulder.

Cas chuckles, low, ruffling Dean’s hair. “Or a teddy bear.”

“This ain’t gonna do much for my badass rep.”

“You are very badass, Dean.”

In this position, Cas can’t run his fingers so freely over Dean’s body. Dean’d be grouchy about that, only now he keeps brushing them over the expanse of his back and his shoulders. “You’re strong here,” Cas says.

“You made me right,” Dean murmurs back, half-asleep already; Cas’ fingers freeze in the spot, wide lazy spirals halting as he says it. Shit. They don’t usually acknowledge – that happened. It’s a little deep for when he’s this tired. “Hey, man, keep going. It’s good.”

Cas stays stationary for a few beats. When he starts moving again, he might as well be giving Dean a massage. His fingers dig in deep enough that Dean’s breath sputters with every pass of his hands. Dean lets out a curse, something low and warm, and then moves his own hands to slide his fingers down Cas’ spine, learn the dips and grooves in his ribcage. Cas has all his clothes on, but his skin under Dean’s even through the layers is so warm. Dean can picture the flush tinting him under those damn clothes, the ruddiness swooping everywhere.

The night certainly can’t get any weirder. Or more insanely hot.

“Feels good, Cas,” Dean breathes. He angles his hips away, because he’s pretty sure the second they touch between waist and knees, he’s gonna go off like a rocket.

“You too, I –” Cas cuts himself off and practically gargles something. It might be nonsense; it might be the remnants of a thousand ancient languages. “Do you want anything – else?”

Dean knows exactly what Cas is asking, and he has to angle his hips away at the question. But it’s been a long day, and he’s three-quarters asleep already, and – okay, he’s kind of a fucking sap, because the first time _something else_ happens it really needs to be perfect, not when sleep threatens him at any second. “No,” he responds. “Well, uh, lemme make this clear. Not _yet_.”

“Okay.” Cas’ fingers whisper across the back of his neck. Dean’s been too tired to have any more than half a stiffy, even with Cas’ hands all over him, but that touch might as well be a kiss. It makes Dean hard as a fuckin’ diamond, instantly like he’s twenty again, and he might be moaning already. “Whenever you’re ready. Even if it’s never.”

“Hey man, I’m tired, not dead.” He laughs and outright squirms against the sheets. Again, really not doin’ much for his rep, but he doesn’t care. He’s spent years building that up, but the big gorgeous hands all over him, the rumble in his ear, all of it feels a million times better than shoving any emotion he might’ve had down.

Plus, even if his rep flees him, he’s pretty sure he’s still badass enough to kick the ass of anyone who cares.

“Might fall asleep,” he tells Cas.

“I’ll still watch over you.”

“Creepy, dude.” Dean can hear the smile in his voice. “As long as you stay here.”

Cas doesn’t answer with words. His hands settle at Dean’s sides, holding him carefully. Dean feels like he has a hundred, a thousand handprints glowing red on his skin. The warmth of them, he falls into it, and it rocks him to sleep.

 

 

*****

 

Kelly doesn’t know if she’s welcome in the Winchesters’ bunker at just any time. She’d bet she probably isn’t. But that’s where she finds herself this afternoon, standing in the kitchen. At least no one else is there yet.

“Cereal?” Jack asks, and sits down at the table. He puts his elbows down hard on the surface, and rests his chin in his palms. Like when he does most things, Kelly feels her love for him swell, enough that she’s not sure she could get out words right now.

It’s silly, she knows that. Irrational. But unconditional. She used to roll her eyes at people posting pictures of their kids doing absolutely _nothing_ all over Facebook, but – she never knew she could love anything, anyone, this much. But Jack is her son, and he saved her. Saved her again and again. Even without that, she’d fight the world to keep him safe.

So she sets out, digging through the cabinets in this strange kitchen, in order to find some damn cereal.

She’s been mentally debating for at least thirty seconds whether it would be okay to give him Froot Loops – she’s leaning toward no, and it’s lunchtime anyway – when she hears footsteps and whirls around. The tall brother, Sam, is standing there with a huge knife outstretched in her direction. He drops his hand back to his side when he sees her.

“Kelly,” he exhales.

“You carry that around with you?” she asks by way of greeting. She tries to keep her voice light, but he’s six and a half feet tall and carrying around what might as well be a machete. It’s probably magical, too, what with the way these guys seem to operate. “Sleep with it under your pillow?”

“Yeah, actually.” He moves past her; Kelly tenses up for a couple of seconds, but he’s only reaching deeper into the cabinet to pick out a box of cornflakes she’d missed. “For Jack?”

“Yep.” She takes the box from Sam’s outstretched hands and pours it into the bowl Jack has made appear in front of him. “Couldn’t do that to the cornflakes too?” she says to him, quiet and smiling. Kelly’s hands stop shaking when she talks to him.

Jack grouchily digs a spoon into the cornflakes. “I wanted the Froot Loops,” he admits.

“How are you guys, ah, holding up?” Sam asks. Awkwardness is etched all over his face.

“Fine,” Kelly says, “we’re fine.” It’s the truth. Yes, she’s terrified, terrified of a world she doesn’t understand and what it could do to her son. But isn’t that every parent? Her circumstances are special, sure. But so is Jack.

Suddenly, Jack speaks up. “I wanted to say thank you, Sam,” he says, through a mouthful of cornflakes. “I’m – learning. But you helped teach me that good isn’t something you are. It’s all about what you do.”

Sam does a double-take in obvious surprise. “Uh, thank y –”

“Also, you have strong powers. You should use them. They’re not bad. You’d tell me that. Max and Alicia are your friends, and good people who can understand what you’ve gone through more than most can. And Eileen wants there to be something between you two as well –”

“Alright, alright.” Sam’s definitely got two bright red spots high on his cheeks, which is surprisingly _cute_ for someone so damn large and scary. “Taking advice from Lucifer’s kid,” he mutters, mostly to himself, but Kelly can’t help but overhear him.

“Taking advice from _my_ kid,” she chimes in. She feels bad for being a little annoyed, but, well. Her kid. She’s pretty sure Sam wouldn’t blame her, and if he does, maybe she’ll have a chat with Mary.

Her annoyance mostly vanishes when Dean walks into the kitchen. Cas trails behind him; he’s got one hand clapped over Dean’s shoulder for no reason Kelly can figure out. They’ve both got half a foot of height on her, are broad and thick with muscle, and could probably murder her with the cereal box before she knew what was happening. It’s still kind of adorable.

Dean mostly manages to keep his double-take to a minimum, which she can appreciate. “Kelly,” he says. “Uh, Jack.”

Jack either doesn’t notice or ignores the awkwardness from Dean, and nods right back at him. This time, at least, he bothers to finish chewing his bite of cereal before saying, “Hi Dean. I’m actually here to talk to you. And Cas. I just wanted to clarify some stuff.”

“ _Clarify_ is a good word, honey.” The second Kelly speaks, she knows it’s almost unbearably awkward. She tries not to cringe when the three members of the extended Winchester family turn toward her with baffled stares. At least the moment passes quickly.

“I wasn’t the one who brought Cas back to life,” Jack continues. “I could have, but by the time I went to bring him back to life, he was already alive. The power of what brought him back to life, plus my unchecked powers – that’s what tore all those holes across the universe. Universes.” He turns to Cas with a big, probably inappropriate smile. “There’s your cosmic consequences, too! I know you were worried about that.”

Kelly doesn’t have a clue what Jack is talking about – just how much crap are the Winchesters involved with, anyway? – but Cas’ eyes flare wide, even as he judders out a breath caught between surprise and relief.

“So what the hell brought Cas back?” Kelly barely knows Dean, but she’s not surprised at the bite in his voice.

“It’s funny you should say that.” At Jack’s words, Dean glances down at the floor, then looks back up. He’s clearly trying very, very hard to be stoic. Sam’s face is covered in sharp glee. Lord, Kelly wishes she understood all the nuances here, because she’s had a hard goddamn year and could use some entertainment. “Cas ended up tethered to a soul. I’d explain how, but we would literally be here until the stars in this universe burnt out. The physics are very complicated. But the power is very simple. All it needs is the potential for love.”

“Whose soul is it?” Dean asks.

Other than Cas, Kelly doesn’t know these people. She has no idea who they are, other than entirely terrifyingly tall and handsome and far too good with a number of scary weapons. But like, she has eyes. She’s seen Dean and Cas together.

She traveled with Cas for what felt like decades. Despite that, he’s still inhuman, wildly inscrutable. But she does know some things. She knows he tries harder than anyone she’s ever met. She knows how hard he attempted to help in every universe they landed in, and took it personally when he couldn’t. She knows the way his shoulders sag in relief when he sees Jack, relief at his gamble paying off. She knows how he throws himself at every fire he sees.

But above all, she knows that for Cas, the entire time they were away, the axis of the world still spun around Dean. A billion dimensions from home, and it was still true for him. And there was no thought involved, ever; it simply _was_. She wonders –

“Why are you even asking? You must know it’s _you_ , Dean.”

Jack echoes her thoughts. The kitchen is very quiet after that.

“It’s been a good visit!” Jack announces, seemingly oblivious to the emotional atom bomb he’s dropped right in the middle of the bunker. “I’ll be back to visit too. Cas, call my mom, it’s hard to make friends –”

Kelly’s grateful they vanish right after that. But she doesn’t know the place where they end up. It’s certainly not the little apartment they found last minute to get out of the Winchesters’ hair. No, this is a real house, a homey kitchen with a huge chrome refrigerator and overly pristine paneling. She rushes to the window and sees a riot of green outside. In the distance, other pretty little houses, blue and white and pastel yellow, sprout up out of perfect lawns.

“Can this be our house?” Jack asks, almost shy.

“Of course.” Kelly’s not sure how she could ever say no to her son. Her perfect son, all hers, even after everything the Devil and the universe tried to throw at her.

“Not just ours. There are people out there, their lives are hard. They have nothing, and the world can be so cruel. I want to try and make things better.”

She feels a couple of tears spill down her face at that, unbidden. She thinks of the man she thought Rooney was, and the kind of person Cas is. Maybe he really has taught Jack, and the world will be better for it. She doesn’t know where to begin with their life, how to make friends for her and Jack, and her mind is spinning furiously when –

She turns around and screams, rushing in front of Jack even though he’s the last creature in this universe that could ever need her protection, because there’s a strange man in her house. A short, scruffy man, wearing _tie-dye_ for goodness’ sake, but still a man she doesn’t know.

“What?” he says, throwing up his hands, palms out, like _he_ is terrified of _her_. “I can’t want to see my only grandkid?”

 

 

*****

 

The kitchen’s quiet for a long time after that. No one even pretends to eat anything, or read the books spilling over the table. They’re just – real fuckin’ quiet.

“Well, that was an interesting talk,” Sam declares. His face is neutral. Too neutral. “I think I’m gonna, uh, make a phone call. See you guys later.”

The damn traitor’s out of the room in what’s gotta be less than two seconds.

Dean expects more awkwardness from Cas. The guy is king of awkwardness, and rarely understands human social cues. But a few seconds after Sam’s gone, Cas reaches over and grabs Dean’s hand with his own. It’s not comfort; it’s a desperate grip, meant to keep Dean here. His palm is warm enough that it’s nearly hot.

“Thank you,” Cas says, fervent. “I – in the past, I know I’ve said terrible things about being alive. I didn’t want to exist any more. Peace, not freedom, remember. But knowing you, Dean, knowing Sam and Mary and Claire and Kelly and – all the people in this beautiful, wild life. I want to keep _living_. It isn’t always easy, but I know I have to keep going. For everything I’ve done, and everything I need to do. Want to do. And you make it so. I realize now, life’s a _gift_. I’ll keep it.”

Dean’s not sure what the hell he was expecting. But it wasn’t that, which steals the breath out of his throat. With his own words, to boot. “Cas, buddy,” he breathes out, eventually, “I’m – I’m really glad you’re here.”

He chuckles. His nerves leech out of him. There’s still tension sizzling between him and Cas, but – it’s not the bad kind of tension. He’s been realizing that since they finally put it all on the table those few days ago. It’s the kind of tension that, when it snaps, releases something gorgeous.

“I could use lunch.” There’s a wry smile on Cas’ face. Dean busies himself with throwing together a sandwich.

“How many jalapeños?”

“All of them.”

“We’re gonna be the first people to go broke because of jalapeños, and you’re gonna burn your tongue off, angel or not.” Dean’s grumbling, but there’s absolutely no heat behind it. They eat together, mostly quiet, but comfortable. Dean’s never had to do anything with Cas other than _be_.

“Jack is – he’s not a bad kid,” Dean says, after he’s done licking the last of his sandwich crumbs off his finger. Kinda gross, but the sandwich was just that good. People really gotta stop saying “crumbs” like they’re a bad thing, anyway, when it’s really all about the bread you get it from. (It doesn’t hurt that Cas licks the crumbs off his finger, too, and his tongue flicks out pinkly.)

“No, not at all.”

“Kinda reminds me of you at first. Not a lot of filter.”

Cas smiles at that. “He is mostly angel. An angel with a soul.” Cas sighs and leans back in his chair; he’s always a little stiff with his movements, but the movement itself is so human, Dean can’t help but smile. “They used to tell us, in what you would call _re-education camp_ , that souls were dangerous things. They had too much power, they were too intoxicating. Well, I’m walking proof of that now. In ways both bad and good.”

Dean lets himself stare at Cas for a very long time. Cas and him, they never stopped breaking the rules. They threw fate the middle finger time after time after time; the two of them are a lot of things, but destiny was never one of them. And yet there was always something drawing him to Cas, something that brought them back to each other over and over.

It was literal. It was never meant to be. It was them. They made it up as they’d gone along. Go figure.

They walk together after dinner. Dean realizes, eventually, that Cas is following him. To his room. His stomach feels like it’s doing the samba, but it’s – it’s not nerves. It’s actually excitement.

Dean holds the door to his room open. Cas looks at him for a second, nods almost quick enough to miss, and steps inside.

There’s obvious emotion on Cas’ face as he looks around every corner of the room, even if most of it’s just blank walls. Dean stifles the urge to roll his eyes. “Colt ain’t under the pillow this time,” he says instead.

Cas is actually cringing as he settles into one of Dean’s chairs. Great. “I really am sorry about –”

“It’s fine. Only me in here.”

“More than enough.”

It’s mostly dark in the room, only one of the overheads on. Cas’ profile is gorgeous when it catches just a hint of the light. Staring at it as he does, Dean settles on the bed, rubbing his hands over his knees to fight off the nerves that now spring up.

“There’s just – well, I guess there’s one thing I wanna know,” Dean admits, eventually.

“What?”

“What was, the, uh – the makeout session about? With the alt-universe you.”

Cas half-rolls his eyes at Dean, the type of reaction where Cas clearly doesn’t understand Dean’s strange human ways but displays no real malice toward him, and God, he’s missed that so much. “That was not a _makeout session_ , Dean.” Cas’ mouth forming its way around those words – Dean can’t think about it too much. He’s grateful Cas keeps talking. “I was sharing my memories with him. I think he understands certain things better now.”

“Like…”

Before he speaks, Cas slides his hand over Dean’s forearm. It’s slow, careful, deliberate. Cas has touched him before, and God knows Dean luxuriated in the memory of those touches. God knows he’d put one hand over the spot where Cas’ fingers had warmed him just hours before while he used the other hand to frantically get himself off. But this touch, there’s something new in it, Cas’ searching fingers a seedling curling its way into the sunlight.

Hand still on Dean’s forearm, lying warm in the crook of Dean’s elbow, Cas speaks. “He wanted to understand your soul, I think.”

Dean wants to flinch away from Cas’ touch. But every instinct he has, as always, tells him to stay right where he is and lean into it. He’s not going to fight those any more; his instincts make him a damn good hunter, and Cas’ fingers and palm are so warm. “Not much to understand.”

“That isn’t true. You have to know that.” Cas doesn’t even look angry when he meets Dean’s eyes. There’s a weary expression on his face, a little sad.

Dean changes the topic, quick. It’s too charged in here; he needs to find a release valve. “You shared memories, huh. How much did you get of his?”

“All of them,” Cas says plainly.

“All of them, so – just in his world, or –”

“Here too.”

The shift in his voice tells Dean the answer to his next question. But he asks it anyway. “Everything?”

“Dean.” Cas still has his hand on Dean’s arm. Dean’s terrified, but he can’t imagine moving away. “I know there were things you would have never said to me. I’m sorry I heard them without your consent.”

“Are you sorry you heard them?”

Cas finally looks away from Dean. His profile, again, is gorgeous in the light; his eyelashes skim his cheek when he says, “No.”

Cas stays quiet. Dean is quiet, too. There’s a step to take, but for a long time, he doesn’t know what it should be.

Finally, he reaches out a hand. It lands on Cas’ knee, low enough to be platonic, but – he’s a dude touching another dude’s leg while they’re alone in his room, and having this conversation. There’s Dean’s step forward: touch, understanding, comfort. It’s what they’ve always been, together.

“The, uh, memory sharing. It only work with two angels, or is it gonna work with a human and an angel?”

Cas raises his head to face Dean again. The expression on his face is nearly inscrutable, but there’s a light behind his eyes that Dean likes a lot. “It should work with a human involved, yes.”

“Well,” Dean pushes on, “you went on a pretty crazy journey, right? Cliffs Notes ain’t gonna cut it. I wanna see it all.”

Now there’s a clear smile on Cas’ face. Small, but obvious. “You can if you want.”

His hand spreads low on Dean’s belly, below his navel even. It’s a tentative touch, but it’s there. There might have been a flimsy-ass platonic gauze over Dean’s touch before, but there’s no mistaking this, not when Cas’ entire palm fits over such a vulnerable spot, not when he could move his hand an inch or two down and massage the heel of it into Dean’s dick.

Dean squirms at that, which is kinda pathetic, but it ain’t out of discomfort. Cas slides his hand up, pausing over Dean’s heart. It thuds right under Cas’ fingers. The two of them keep staring at each other. Cas’ hand moves up and up, until it’s around the back of Dean’s neck. Pulling him closer.

“This will change things, you know.” Cas’ eyes are so dark with want. It takes Dean’s breath away.

“I do.” Dean lets himself touch now, one hand around Cas’ waist and the other on his shoulder. God, he’s pathetic, but he’s gonna be like Velcro to Cas now that the guy’s back, and now that he can do this. “Bring it.”

In the next beat, they’re kissing. Dean’s thought about this so many times, in so many ways, from some totally humiliating butterfly kisses to Cas shoving him into a wall after a hunt that nearly went bad with the two of them all dirty and bloody and reeking. One of his favorite fantasies, though, was right here, on his bed. And now he _has_ it.

Cas’ mouth is warm and wet. His tongue reaches out first, and Dean’s eager to curl his own around it in return. He’s so tempted to pull Cas onto the bed, tug him down on top of him into the splay of his legs and go from there. But not now. Not yet.

The world stays focused around the two of them, their mouths, their hands, their warmth. But eventually, it starts to spread out before him.

Dean sees a thousand universes. A million. More.

They start in Thunderdome, sure, but then the smoke dissolves and Dean’s on a flat white plain, nothing in the distance but sky. The vines melt away, and he’s in an enormous city with silver-tinged humanoids staring at him. They approach and disappear just in time, until Dean’s rocked by the sea. He falls into it, sputtering, only to emerge gasping into a forest smack-dab in the middle of fall, the leaves drifting golden and crimson and chestnut all around him. That one sticks around a while.

He catches glimpses of Kelly sometimes, or Jack. In the enormous mirror of his eyes, Jack turns every world into a wonder; Kelly, for her part, just looks freaked to hell. Dean always thought she was a pretty smart lady.

Eventually, though, these worlds narrow down to one face. Dean’s own face. A lot of them look just like him, but even more look too different: he’s got different-colored hair, or _Sam’s hair_ horrifyingly enough, or he’s bald. He’s heavier, enough to have a double or triple chin, or he’s so gaunt his eyes practically sink into his skull. He’s very old, or a young child. In a few of them, he’s a chick. But it’s always him.

And in none of these worlds do the other versions of him recognize Cas. Some of them look curious, shocked, _fucking terrified_. But others, others react in an instant and batter him with fists or bullets; they don’t hurt him, but Dean still feels himself flinch under Cas’ hands. (They run back over his shoulders, soothe him in return.) A couple of them rush toward Cas with an angel blade of their own, and Dean has to remind himself that he’s wrapped up in Cas, Cas, Cas, so he doesn’t puke.

At every one of these mirror versions of himself, Dean feels a black and ragged curl of pain inside Cas rising higher and higher. He knows it too well. It’s the feeling that rammed right into his own gut when he looked at Castiel, all these months.

Then, finally, he’s staring at his own face – his real face. He’s on his ass outside the bunker again, the rain hammering him. But then Cas reaches out his hand, and he watches his own face go sun-bright. Gold and silver mist spins around the two of them, catching brilliantly on everything, lighting the entire storm up like the fancy-ass white Christmas lights he’s only ever seen in movies.

Is that them, to Cas? Is that him?

Dean’s own memories lift out of him and join the swirl between the two of them. A few months ago, he might have said that was one of his worst nightmares But now, it’s just a relief. He’ll work on the words, he will. But at the best of times for him and Cas, they never needed words.

He gets one last memory. In Heaven’s Garden, Cas walks alongside Joshua. Instinctively, Dean knows this memory took place before anything else he just saw from Cas.

Dean sees the garden two ways. Through his own eyes, it’s still the Cleveland Botanical Gardens. Thick green vegetation of all kinds sprawls across the floor and blankets the trunks of the trees. The air’s so humid under the shining glass roof, he could chew it.

He can also somehow see it from Cas’ point of view; to Cas, the garden’s a modest vegetable patch, apple trees lining its side.

Dean turns around in Cas’ mind – almost none of this is making sense to him, but he’s willing to just go with it – and realizes the little garden is in the shadow of the bunker. He can’t help but smile. The dual sensation of the moment, face warmed by the sunlight in the garden and lips pushed against Cas’ back in the bunker, sends shivers through his body.

Joshua, in the vessel Dean’s used to, regards Cas with a critical if warm glance. “I need _you_ on this mission,” he tells Cas. “Kelvin and Hozai, they’re good soldiers. They’re trained well.”

“That they are,” Cas says, a probing answer. He clearly doesn’t know where this is going either.

“And they can’t do what you can do.” Joshua laughs, rich and comforting.

Cas’ returning laugh is short, more of a smack than a laugh. “Why me?”

“You know why.” Joshua pauses in their walk; his grace leaps around Cas’, which stays cautious but welcomes him anyway. “You feel it. You’ve said it. What you understand, what you carry within you, no other angel does. Certainly not me. You are the only one who can show the nephilim the way.”

Cas finally separates from Dean. Their lips make a wet smack as the two of them pull apart, but they stay close. Cas’ hands are still on his shoulders; Dean still has one arm hooked around his waist. The proximity is comforting, even as it sizzles.

“That’s some trick,” Dean gasps.

“Do you understand now?” Cas says by way of an answer. His lips shine wetly in the overhead light. “Why we were so fortunate that Jack was born in this dimension, and not any other? The only reason why he was able to learn goodness from someone like _me_?”

“Cas, you’re good, you’re always good, but – I don’t.” Dean’s voice sounds funny to his ears. But not bad. Not at all. For once, nothing is bad here.

“This is the dimension where I know you,” Cas tells him. “The one where I love you.”

When Dean closes the gap between them again, it isn’t for the sake of getting any more old memories out of Cas. It’s because the two of them, together, are going to make some new ones.


	4. Chapter 4

The next morning isn’t awkward. Dean wakes up first. Years ago, he remembers making a big deal about Cas watching over him in his sleep. Now, he keeps his eyes on Cas; all the lines on his face have been smoothed out while he snoozes. He wants to run a hand through Cas’ hair, bring him even closer to Dean, but he holds himself back for that one moment.

They’ve got time. God, they’ve finally got time.

They’d spent the rest of the night kissing. Kissing and kissing and kissing. Cas popped a few buttons on Dean’s shirt and licked the salt out of the hollow of Dean’s throat. Dean had shifted angles at one point and it had dragged the space between their legs together; the contact there made Dean involuntarily bite Cas’ lip, made Cas give an all-throat moan in return, and well – it’s a miracle things didn’t go any farther.

He isn’t holding back, neither of them are. Not like they can keep their hands off each other anyway. They know they’ll fall into it when they do.

All of a sudden, Cas’ eyes snap open, and he sits up in bed like a bolt.

“Still working on the sleeping thing, huh, buddy?” Dean asks, moving forward so Cas’ body is bracketed between his legs.

“I have no need for it as an angel,” Cas grouches out. Whether he actually slept or not, his voice sure sounds like it, all gravel. “But it’s still enjoyable.”

“You’re tellin’ me. My four hours are the highlight of any day.”

Cas shoots him a very exaggerated frown. “You should sleep more, since unlike me, you _do_ require it.”

Dean drops his head into the space between Cas’ neck and shoulder. With the way he’s sitting, his t-shirt pulls away from his body, revealing a long strip of skin. It’s hard not to say _screw breakfast_ and lick Cas right up. “Workin’ on it. This helps. You want food, too?”

“Are jalapeños acceptable for breakfast?”

“I can’t really judge anyone’s food choices. But no.”

Cas makes a disturbingly adorable noise (Dean did not just think _adorable_ , he has never used that word in his life) and rolls away, burying his head under the sheets. “I’ll be out later then.”

“Man, you don’t even need that.” Dean laughs and rubs his hand over where he thinks Cas’ shoulder is. If that hand lands somewhere more interesting, oh well. “Do you think – uh, would it be okay if I said something to Sam? Or Mom?”

Cas pushes the blanket down a little, until his eyes are visible. The levity’s gone from them, but it’s nothing bad; he just looks serious now. “I know that’s a big step, Dean.” Under the blanket, one of Cas’ hands reaches out and touches Dean’s wrist. “Of course you can tell them. But if you don’t want to yet, that’s alright too.”

Dean only has to consider it for a second or two. “I’ve held back enough. I don’t wanna hide this. Least I can do is tell them.”

At that, Cas nods. He sits right up in bed, not even using his hands to push himself up, and shit that’s hot. But before Dean can get too distracted by Cas’ abdominal muscles, he’s distracted by his lips, his hands all over Dean’s torso, his fingers on his neck warm over his pulse.

“Shit, dude,” Dean breathes when they separate. Cas’ hair is all fucked up, mussed by sleep and fingers alike. A couple of darker spots mark his neck, and Dean’s never been the hickey type because he’s not fifteen friggin’ years old, but he couldn’t resist when it came to Cas. Dean can’t even imagine what he’d see on himself if he looked in the mirror. “I gotta make breakfast. You’re distracting me.”

“That’s what you get for separating me from my jalapeños,” Cas says, almost primly. He presses one last kiss to Dean’s lips, chaste but warm, and then thuds back down into bed.

When Dean gets to the kitchen, Mary is already there. Her hair’s tied back but messy, and she’s still in pajama pants and a loose henley. The smell of frying eggs fills the air. She’s even worse than Sammy is when it comes to cooking, but just being here, making eggs, pulling herself out of a dream world for him, dragging the closest thing to Cas out of another dimension then putting up with Dean’s mopey ass for months – Dean already knew it, but he loves her so much.

“How are you?” Mary asks. Her tone’s kind, but there’s still wariness in her voice.

Dean’s great. He really is. That’s what he means to say.

Instead, he blurts out, “Mom, I, uh. I like guys.”

The second the words are out of his mouth, his vision goes blurry, as suddenly as if someone had thrown the tears right into his eyes. Talking about it vaguely with Cas is one thing; saying it out loud is another.

He’s never said that to anyone before. A couple of times, right after Purgatory and before Cas got back to them, Sam had asked him _do you want to talk about it_ in a tone that suggested he wasn’t only talking about slicing and dicing up monsters. For a couple of milliseconds, the offer had seemed – almost good. But then Dean would remember how pissed he was at Sam, and how weary he was from dealing with all of the demon bullshit, and he’d say _nope, I’m good_ and crank the volume of his music up a couple of notches.

And there were – yeah, Dean can admit there have been men throughout the years. Lots of them. At first, he used the excuse that he might as well make the best of hunting on his own; he wouldn’t have gotten the opportunity while hunting with Sam and certainly not with John. Then, he needed to make a couple of bucks. But ultimately, it was all about chasing his loneliness, and the warm strong bodies. Just the fantasy that for a night, he could – be himself, all of himself.

The next thing he’s aware of, there’s a hand on his cheek and another hand clutching at his own. At some point, he must have sunk down into a chair at the kitchen table and laced his fingers together. He’s looking straight down, and got a good view of the floor. When he dares to glance up, though, Mary’s face – she’s open, warm, really smiling.

A weight lifts off Dean’s shoulders, one he didn’t even know he was carrying until that moment.

“Dean,” she breathes, once he’s really met her eyes. “I – thank you for telling me. I love you, no matter what. And I’m so proud of you.” There’s a pause, and Dean feels a tear spill down his cheek like relief itself leaking out of him, but he’s so far past caring.

“I read John’s journal,” Mary continues. She looks down, right at the kitchen table, and suddenly becomes very interested in picking at a corner of the cheap plastic sheeting covering it. “I loved him, Dean. Love of my life. But – I saw the language he used in there, sometimes. I saw what he said. That’s unacceptable. I’m sorry. I hope you didn’t grow up with that.”

Mary looks up, meeting his eyes, which means now it’s time for Dean to avert his own. Real men, John had taught him, loved the job and bars choked with smoke and too much beer and _women_. If John knew any gay hunters, he didn’t introduce them to Sam and Dean, but he sure as hell knew every derogatory word in the book and was more than happy to parade those around his kids. So maybe Dean grew up thinking that kind of life was incompatible with his own. Even after his dad was gone, those thoughts clogged up who he wanted to be.

Dean knows that if he owns anything, it’s his own damn stubbornness. But he’s glad to admit he was wrong on this.

“I appreciate that,” is all Dean says in return. It’s an understatement, but judging by the way Mary reaches out, squeezes his hand, and meets his eyes, she understands his meaning completely.

“Dean, I’m not – hell, I’m not even as old as you are, technically,” she teases. The light tone drops away to seriousness as she says her next words. “But I’ve seen enough people in this life choose misery and deny themselves any sort of happiness. I’ve seen enough people spurn _love_. I’d never stand in the way of the people I love the most on this earth finding it. I messed things up, I held you back long enough –”

“Mom, no –”

“But not this. I’d never stop you from this.” She pauses long enough to let the words sink in. “Does Sam know?”

“I mean, probably, but I never told him,” Dean admits. “I’ve known it about myself for – years, I guess, it’s not just about – you know. But you’re, uh. The first person I’ve told. Ever.” He can’t help but let out a careful laugh. “Guess I always wanted the first person I told to be my mom. I knew she wouldn’t judge me.”

Mary doesn’t respond verbally to that. She just squeezes his hand tighter. For all that it’s been a rocky go of things, in that touch Dean feels the thirty years he missed with her. He can’t give her those back, but he can try to be someone she can be proud of anyway. They stay like that, love and care unspoken but hovering in the room, until they break apart with a laugh because the now-burnt eggs set off the smoke alarm.

Over toast, Dean tells her, “Mom, I – I never welcomed you back. Hardly ever asked how you were. Never even said thanks –”

“Dean.” Mary reaches over to touch his hand again. “It’s okay. I – from now on, we’ll work on stuff like that. The whole thing where – this family does everything for each other, but never _talks_ to each other about it.”

Dean can’t help the laugh that blurts out of his mouth. “You’re really not the only one who needs to work on that.”

The rest of their conversation flows normally, for hunters. Dean points out some of the more demonic omens from the book she’s reading, because even if Cas said Hell was sealed up, better safe than sorry; Mary catches him up on Linda Tran, who’s been taking out rakshasas across the East Coast. Seems kinda right that the two of them and Jody have a badass hunter mom club.

Whatever they say now, though, there’s a warmth between them. A new understanding. Mary goes to the library to check out a couple more books, but she squeezes Dean’s hand before she goes.

Dean takes off from the kitchen soon after. Makes him itchy if he’s in there alone for too long. Of course, he walks smack dab into Sam right as he exits the kitchen for the hallway.

“How much did you hear?” Dean practically yells. Anything important he said must’ve been half an hour ago at least, but he’s still raw about it.

Sam’s eyebrows lift into his hairline. “Nothing.” Dean must shoot him a look after that, because he adds, “Really.”

Dean could keep walking. There’s probably a while before he’s going to have to talk about this to Sam. But instead, he plants his feet, and as nonchalantly as possible, tosses out, “So I think me and Cas are a thing.”

Sam purses his lips, but his eyes actually fucking twinkle. He’s obviously trying very, very hard not to grin very, very wildly, and mostly failing. Dean’s expecting a smug-ass _I knew it!_ , and he’s already feeling kinda grouchy about the presumptuousness, but all Sam does is reel him in against his chest with one of his enormous arms.

“Congrats. Thank you.”

“For what?” Dean laughs basically into Sam’s hair. Eileen kicks so much ass, but she must have truly tragic taste if this is what she’s into.

Sam pulls back. “A lot,” he says at last. Dude’s fucking misty-eyed. Dean would call him a sap, only he’s pretty sure he’s in the same state. “My life? Thanks.” Dean wants to protest, but after a blink, Sam’s eyes are clearer and he’s shoving Dean by the shoulder and grinning. Friggin’ little brothers. “Ugh, Dean, you’re so full of shit sometimes. That case with the freaky nachzehrers –”

“You mean _ghoulpires_ –”

“– talking a big game about how all get are one-night stands and batting zero in domestic life while Cas was watching Netflix all snuggled in your bed back home.”

Dean’s amazed Sam remembers that. But he can’t really call him on it, because he totally remembers it too. _And_ had the same thought at the time.

“Alright,” Dean responds, still grinning wildly. “I love chick flicks and all, but I could only take so many heart-to-hearts on _Buffy_.”

Laughing and shaking his head, Sam steps aside so that Dean can continue down the hall. Back to his room.

He gets to the door and stares for a long time. It feels like he uprooted his entire life this morning, but – it’s not a bad thing. Not at all. He’s tilling the dirt so the seeds can flourish.

In his head, Dean can see Cas on the other side of the door. Sitting on his bed, probably, carving out a spot in the memory foam of his own. Waiting for Dean. Staying, at last.

Dean pushes open the damn door.

Cas isn’t small, not at all. God knows Dean had many a very, very happy, if previously goddamn bittersweet, dream about just his chest and the span of his shoulders. But missing his jacket and sitting on the bed, his palms placed behind him in support, Cas looks it.

It’s not sad, though. The smile on his face when he sees Dean – it’s anything but. If anything, it just proves where he belongs. One not-man, here to do what he can on Earth.

“Hey,” Dean says. He doesn’t even think about it before sitting right next to Cas on the bed. It’s almost comically close, but their sides squish up against each other and that’s what Dean needs right now. “I told Mom and Sam about us. They took it really well.”

“I thought they would.” Cas buries his face in Dean’s neck, kisses a delicate column right where it makes Dean shiver. Part of Dean really, really wishes Cas wouldn’t do that while they’re chatting about his mom and brother, but that part’s drowned out by the much much larger part of his mind screaming at Cas to keep going. “They’re the best people I know, present company excluded. And I believe the two of them may have thought we were already together anyway.”

Dean slides his arms over Cas’ stomach. His shirt’s in the way, but he’s still warm there, and Dean feels the little quiver pulse through Cas’ body. Cas does the same to him a beat later, and it’s awkward with both of their bulk. At least until their arms braid together, and then – why did they ever do anything else? “Don’t think it was much of a surprise for Sam either. He’s had a front row seat to all our shit. As far as the liking dudes part, he walked in on me getting Eiffel Towered once. That’s, uh –”

“I’m aware.”

Dean’s not hard just yet, but at the tone in Cas’ voice, he has to splay his thighs open. He doesn’t miss the way Cas’ eyes flick down to the suggestive pose. “Well, shit,” Dean chuckles darkly. “But yeah. Not surprised the dude thing ain’t a shock to him.”

They kiss for a while, slow and lazy and wet. Cas’ mouth seems hotter than it was last night, and his tongue slides into and out of Dean’s mouth. In-out, in-out, and Dean finds himself digging the balls of his feet into the floor so he can get the room he desperately needs inside his pants –

“Can I lock the door?” Cas asks, suddenly, not more than a nose length away.

Dean huffs. “You’re a friggin’ genius.”

It’s a tragedy when Cas gets up. But Dean’s also glad for a few seconds to clear his head. He knew they were gonna fall into this soon; the making out, the chaste but pointed touching. It all felt too good for them not to keep running in whatever direction it’d take them. Sex with Cas is a terrifying idea, but right now the arousal nerves are winning out over the nerve-nerves that tell him to unlock that door and march right out. And that’s a good thing.

It’s not that Cas is an angel and it’s not that Cas is a man. It’s that Cas, Dean knows, is going to be _it_.

They’re quiet when Cas sits back down. “That was a precursor to having sex, yes?” Cas asks.

Dean laughs, warm, a full belly laugh that wracks his whole body. God, he can feel it in his dick, when he laughs. “Yeah. Of course.”

“Good.” Cas punctuates it with a kiss, open-mouthed but no tongue. “I used to think sex was boring, repetitive motion with little point but reproduction –”

“Don’t sell me too hard on it, buddy.”

Cas moves his hands to cup Dean’s jaw. His fingertips dig in just enough that Dean feels woozy when he speaks. But maybe that’s just Cas. “But then I experienced it. It was – with someone I felt nothing deeper for, and I don’t exactly have good memories of what came after –” Dean tightens his grip around Cas’ stomach at that – “but it was more enjoyable than I could have imagined.”

“Don’t knock it ‘til you try it, I always say.”

A small smile quirks over Cas’ lips. “You’re very wise. I learned to bring this kind of pleasure to myself. But none of it compares to this, already.”

Dean’s brain practically goes offline at the thought of Cas _jerking off_ , sliding his huge hands all over himself, a sunset-colored flush spreading a path down his body. Maybe he liked to slide a finger into himself when he jacked it like Dean does, and came writhing on his own hand.

It’s a good thing Cas lands on his lap, because his thick presence is the sweetest way to bring him out of his own thoughts. “Did I distract you?” he asks, practically doing the coquette blinking-eye shit.

Dean somehow manages to point a finger at his face. “No faux-innocent crap any more.”

Cas must not have a snarky answer for that, for once, because he resumes kissing him. Dean really, really doesn’t mind getting shut up that way. They push and pull each other, kiss and kiss, until he finds the headboard rubbing against his back.

The wood’s too hard and uncomfortable, and he kinda wishes the sharp noise it makes every time it smacks the wall would be from something a little more fun. But he can’t concentrate on much more than Cas’ tongue learning Dean’s mouth, Cas’ thighs straining to straddle around his waist, Cas’ knuckles going white with how desperately he clutches his lapels to pull him closer so they can keep making out.

Every sensation Dean has right now, it’s Cas.

Finally, Cas breaks away from him. He stays close though, enough that Dean can feel his breath every time he speaks. He smells like caramel and ice chips and Dean wants that taste sticking to his mouth. “I’d like to take off some of your clothes. This might be easier.”

“Don’t have to ask, buddy,” Dean says in return, but his last few words are cut off in Cas’ haste to push his t-shirt off from the bottom hem. Dean’s the one who ends up wrestling it off, because Cas’ hands already went to his zipper. The noise of him undoing it sounds very loud in the room, and so does the breath of relief that jolts out of Dean.

Cas doesn’t keep touching between Dean’s legs, though. Instead, he’s tugging Dean down, until he’s flat on his back on the bed. And then his tongue is on Dean’s stomach, rubbing his cheek against it in a stupidly affectionate gesture. Dean almost laughs, but then Cas chooses that time to rub his thumbs against Dean’s nipples and the laugh breaks into a moan. Dean stuffs his hand over his mouth.

“Very sensitive there, yes?”

Dean doesn’t know how he has any blood left anywhere outside his dick, but his cheeks heat up at Cas’ words. “Yeah.”

Cas looks at him, smiles, and flicks his tongue over one of his nipples. God, Dean’s hand travels downward, because if Cas is gonna tease him at least he can get some relief somewhere –

“Don’t,” Cas tells him. “You trust me, right?”

“Yeah.” He hasn’t always. But right here, right now, in his bed – their bed, if Cas wants – Dean does, with all of him.

“I’ll take care of that.” He slips his fingers between Dean’s, which makes him blush harder than he had before, even. “And don’t hold yourself back. The walls here are thick. I want to hear you. Think I’ve wanted it for a long time.”

“How long?”

Cas swings a leg over Dean’s hips until they’re pressed together. His back is one sweet arch, and the one benefit to not touching himself is that Dean’s hands can run up and down the easy curve. His fingertips drag goosebumps from the skin wherever they touch.

“I don’t think I recognized I lusted for you until I was human, during the end of the first apocalypse,” Cas says at last. “Not exactly an ideal time. The love, that I can’t pinpoint. Maybe always. You heard what Jack said.” His hands move up again, until they’re splayed over the ghost of his handprint on Dean’s shoulder.

Dean claps his own hand over Cas’, before kissing him again, and again and again. He meant for it to be simple, something like gratitude, but before long, the two of them are taking each other apart again. Their tongues push against each other, while Cas cradles his face, and Dean’s entire face burns. For his part, Dean’s got his hands stuffed down the back of Cas’ pants so he can finally touch his ass, their hips see-sawing enough to shake the bed. They’re hard, they’re so hard against each other even through all the layers of clothing, and they’re close –

“ _Wait_ ,” Dean heaves out, even though stopping this is the hardest thing in the world right now. “Wait. I wanted to say – what you said. I think I would have been, uh, down for this from the second you showed up in that barn. You’re pretty hot, man. But I only realized how bad I had it for you when you walked into that lake. Then I kept losing you and it felt like – like it was mocking me for not –”

“I know,” Cas says. Dean at least slid his hands out from inside Cas’ pants, but Cas’ palms still cup his cheeks. His wrists shake, and the idea of Cas being as overwhelmed by this as Dean is kinda blows his mind a little. Now, though, the touch soothes him. “Remember? I know. And it’s alright now, Dean.”

Dean smiles. He lets himself take one of Cas’ hands, because somehow that makes him feel better than anything else. “I’m just glad we made it here.”

Cas looks ridiculous. His hair’s practically standing on end, his shirt’s all wrinkled from being shoved every which way, red mouth-shaped bruises dot his skin here and there, and Dean loves him so much. “Me too.”

Talking about loss definitely made Dean, uh, deflate a little, but with his hand still in Dean’s, Cas kisses down his neck in a zig-zag line and _hello_ , he’s back again. The touch of Cas’ lips is gentle, careful, like Dean’s something precious. When Cas touches him, he could start to believe it.

Then Cas bites Dean’s nipple, his teeth firm against the hard bud, and Dean’s crying out and clawing at the sheets.

“Shit.” He’s whining, and his balls are so drawn up in an effort not to come. Already. He knows he kinda loses it in bed sometimes, but he’s embarrassing himself and Cas hasn’t even touched his dick yet. But the look in Cas’ eyes is still like a furnace.

Cas sits back a few inches. Dean’s front feels like the inside of a freezer at the loss of contact, however temporary. “I’ve, um. I’ve long wanted to bring you to orgasm in a certain way. It may seem odd to you at first. Is that alright?”

“When I think _odd_ , I think, uh, are you gonna shove anything that’s not your dick, fingers, or tongue up my ass? Or uh, there are toys, and those are fine, but anything else –” He should really, _really_ stop talking. “I’d prefer it if you didn’t do that.”

In a clear attempt not to laugh, Cas purses his lips with merriment dancing all over his face, and briefly looks away. “No. I promise you that.”

“Then it’s all good. _Anything_. Well, no shoving anything into my dick, either.”

“Definitely not.” Cas’ poker face has taken full effect, but the mirth makes his eyes fuckin’ sparkle.

“Awesome. Take your shirt off first.”

Cas does so; his muscles flex so gorgeously when he tosses the shirt to the corner of the room, then pulls Dean on top of him. From this position, it’s easier for Dean to finally touch and kiss his fill of Cas’ chest; Cas doesn’t flip out when Dean puts tongue and teeth to his nipples like Dean does, but his lips part and he’s panting, so it’s good. It’s so good.

“You ready?” Cas asks, at last.

“Always.”

Before the word’s all the way out, Cas shoves Dean’s pants and boxers down at last. “That’s it,” Dean gasps as Cas curls his palm around Dean’s cock.

He looks down, because fuck, he’s gotta see it. The light’s dim in the room and it’s dark between their bodies, but he can still see the fat head of his cock emerging from and retreating into the easy warm cup of Cas’ hand. He’s getting those gorgeous fingers slick and messy with every pass, and it just makes Dean more desperate.

“I wanted to see you come with my body,” Cas tells him, riding Dean’s hips as he lets him fuck into his fist, “and my grace.”

While Cas strokes, it’s like the atmosphere rises. Something probes at Dean’s mind, asking permission, and all Dean can do is sigh out _yes_.

Then the world goes supernova white.

Dean cries out. No noise comes out of him; a noise loud enough that everyone living in Lebanon can hear it comes out of him. His entire body pulses, _vibrates_. The pressure on his dick is more than fingers now, turned into a slow filthy beautiful roll he rubs up against, over and over.

He feels cold enough to thrill his bones and hot enough to boil him. The human and damn-near-divine sensations twirl around each other; Cas’ hand still jacks him, a little harder and slower than Dean would go on himself but more than enough to make his dick wet with precome. At the same time, the essence of everything Cas is sinks right down into his damn pores and fires all the neurons in his brain on overload.

This is like Magic Fingers times a thousand. If Magic Fingers touched the back of his neck so gently and carefully, like he could ever be worthy of this, and kissed him until he felt his whole body go loose with the passion behind it. If Magic Fingers said _I love you_ after he finally pulled away.

With those words, Dean comes, but that’s not the right word for it. Not at all. Whatever Cas is doing to him, it’s like a missile determined to seek every shred of goodness from his shitty little life, and pull it to the surface. It’s watching fireworks with Sammy and the thrill of a hunt gone really right and pie fresh out of the oven and the few times he acknowledges he helped save the fucking _universe_. It’s the two of them, here, in their bed, while Dean makes stupid inhuman noises and doesn’t care a bit.

Dean comes back to himself eventually. He’s panting when he does. Cas dusts his fingers over his spent cock; his stomach and hand is streaked sticky white. His eyes meet Dean’s, and he looks stupidly – shy, somehow. “Was that alright?”

“Alright?” Dean echoes, and chuckles as best he can. He’s still catching his breath. “Yeah, I’d say that was –” Talking’s overrated. He finds himself dragging Cas against him and kissing him again. His mouth’s gonna be bruised, and his own come ends up smeared all over his stomach when they rub together so close, and he doesn’t care when it’s this damn amazing.

Years might pass, but eventually, Dean’s urging Cas onto his feet, and practically stumbling to follow him before he struggles to open Cas’ button fly. His hands aren’t shaking, he notes with glee. That’s good. Smooth. Those same hands reach into the now-splayed vee of his pants, past the elastic of his underwear band, and God, he’s _touching Cas_.

Cas is huge, Dean can tell even like this, and thick, and his tongue goes all itchy at the thought, but he ignores that feeling to jack him. His palm barely fits around. He wanted to go slow, really make Cas enjoy it half as much as Dean enjoyed his version of a handjob, but he finds himself frantic to feel more of him. They kiss, over and over, their spare hands roving, but Dean pulls back to see Cas’ face. He’s all fluttery eyelashes, parted mouth, flushed skin ruddy. Stunning.

“You wanna come like this?” Dean whispers after a few minutes. It’s a bad angle and his wrist aches. But he can feel the blood pumping through Cas, how warm he is, the stretch in his hand, and Dean’s never felt so fucking good in his life. “There’s a lot we can do, a handy’s great but –”

Cas shudders in Dean’s hand, though he doesn’t spill over yet. He immediately claps his hand over Dean’s shoulder and locks his eyes on Dean. It could be a hundred moments they’ve had throughout the years, but there’s never been a moment like this, pleasure and promise interlaced. “We’ll do everything,” Cas gasps, moving his free hand into his underwear too, guiding Dean’s movements.

They both definitely don’t fit like this, they don’t fit, so Dean follows the only option he sees. He tugs down Cas’ pants and underwear, and follows their path down himself, until he’s on his knees in front of Cas. Cas stills his hand on his own cock long enough to push three fingers into Dean’s mouth; he takes them in eagerly, sucks them harder when he feels the tremble there.

Once the fingers pull back, Dean wants to tease. He wants to show Cas just how good this can fucking be. He knows what he looks like, what his _mouth_ looks like and what it can do; he’s pretty sure if he stayed around any place long enough he would’ve gotten a rep, and a rep’s no damn good if he couldn’t use it to show the love of his life just how he made him feel. But what Dean ends up doing is dragging his tongue across Cas’ sharp hipbone, then licking it right up his cock.

He fits his lips around the head, and slides up until he’s fit all of Cas that he can into his mouth. He’s warm, so warm, already twitching inside Dean’s cheeks. Dean flicks his tongue around the slit once, and that’s all he wrote. Cas comes, immediately, into his mouth. Dean’s happy he’s able to swallow most of it, but some of it ends up on his cheek. At least it ain’t a bad look, he knows.

After a beat or two, Dean looks up at Cas. It’s a weird angle. His cheeks are still all mottled red. Sweat’s doing funny things to his hair. His dick’s gone limp and rests against his thigh. His socks are still on. He’s gorgeous, and Dean loves him so much.

“I’m so sorry about that,” Cas says, obviously mortified.

Dean grins and rises to his feet. “Don’t be. You said it yourself, we can do everything. Next time, you can even come while you’re on the bed. I recommend it.”

“Your bed. You’re right, the memory foam is very enjoyable.” Cas’ voice swoops like he’s drunk, and God, Dean did that. Cas kisses him again, arms looped around his neck and moving his mouth eventually to taste himself on Dean’s face, but it’s a slow burn now.

They do end up back on the bed, though Dean couldn’t tell you how. The two of them octopus around each other; Dean finds himself still desperate for touch even after everything that just happened, and he’s pretty sure Cas is the same. The guy won’t stop thumbing at his nipples.

“You gotta stop,” Dean manages to wheeze out eventually, even while electricity dances along his spine and in the space low in his stomach. “I – that feels good, so good, but I’m like forty –”

“And I am an angel,” Cas says, even as he stills his hand. “I can do whatever I want to your body or mine. If you wanted to stay hard for hours, you could.”

“Sounds kind of uncomfortable,” Dean says with a dry but warm laugh.

“Do multiple orgasms?”

A happy little shudder wracks Dean’s body. “I’m not sure you’re supposed to use your powers that way.”

“Likely no,” Cas admits, “but I think we’ve always done best when we ignore the rules.” There’s an all too satisfied look on his face, even if he totally deserves it.

Dean rolls onto his side to push their lips together again. It’s whisper-soft and short. “You have some damn good ideas. That – whatever you did to me back there. That was awesome. So I’m down for whatever you wanna do. Just –” He pointedly fights off a giant yawn – “maybe next time.”

Cas curves his body toward him. “We have as long as you’d like.”

They fall back into sleep like that, Cas’ words echoing in Dean’s head.

 

*****

 

There’s a note on the table when they eventually make it back out to the kitchen.

“Jody called about a salt and burn outside Denver, and Mom and Sam took off,” Dean reads out loud. The note’s in Mom’s half-neat, half-sprawling handwriting. “They figured we’d want some space – oh God, do you think they heard us?”

“I did say the walls are thick,” Cas insists. He doesn’t look too worried about it.

“They should be back in a day or two. Claire and her _GF_ – okay, I’m not sure what that means –”

“Girlfriend,” Cas suggests, back now to Dean while he rummages around the kitchen, probably for coffee. He has boxers on now, but his big thighs are right in Dean’s line of sight. His ass. Dean has to take a second before he responds.

“Hey, I had no idea she was – uh – like us. That’s pretty cool.”

Cas, pouring orange juice now, turns back to Dean. “It is.”

“Well, she says mazel tov, and she knew it.” Dean rolls his eyes at that, but it’s all good-natured. “They wanna visit. And come see you. Been too long for you guys, right?”

“We text, if you can believe it. But yes, it will be good to see her.” Cas takes a few strides forward, and not missing a beat, catches Dean’s cheek in his spare hand. They kiss, and Cas’ mouth tastes like orange juice. The fuckin’ domesticity of it thrills Dean to the core. When they separate, Cas carefully inspects the note. “Mary told us to _enjoy_ with several exclamation points. And there’s a smiley face. Maybe she did hear us.”

Dean starts to flush, but then Cas is kissing him again, running fingers carefully up his arms, and he’s so warm that the heat in his cheeks melts right into it. “We are alone now,” Cas says after a couple of kisses. Dean’s dick is already pressing uncomfortably against the cotton of his boxers, even if he’s not totally hard just yet. “If you want, we could have sex in here.”

He blanches. “It’s the _kitchen_!” he exclaims, a little louder than he was expecting to. “That’s unsanitary!”

“I didn’t think you would want to.” There’s a wry smile on Cas’ face. “Anywhere else in the bunker you thought about?”

Only a million different scenarios run through Dean’s head. In place of words, he clutches Cas’ hand, and rushes with him down, down, down the stairs. The thunk of their feet on the metal stairs echoes his heartbeat.

He heads into the garage. The Impala looms in front of them.

Cas’ eyes widen and glitter from surprise and interest alike. Dean catches his face between his hands, and meets him in a kiss, long and slow and loving and so dirty at once. When he breaks away, it’s only to look over his shoulder at Baby and grin.

They end up inside the car so fast Dean wonders if Cas is using his mojo to cheat. He settles his back against Baby’s seats, pulls Cas on top of him, and pushes their mouths together.

For a long time, they kiss, because they can. Cas cups his face, skims hands over his shoulders and arms, brackets his hips. Dean fumbles for the other door’s handle, lost in making out, his other hand caressing its way across Cas’ body. He does get the door open eventually, giving them room to get horizontal in the back seat. Like this, they’re formerly parallel lines, lines that moved closer and closer together until they became one.

Their feet hang out the open door. They kick together a little when they move. Stupidly, it thrills Dean.

Eventually, they both pull away. Cas’ chest rises and falls, heavy, which is awfully fucking gratifying. “I could have us naked and fully prepared with a thought,” he says right into Dean’s ear.

“Next time,” Dean gasps between kisses. He rolls them over, careful, until Cas is the one pressed into the seats. Cas slides down easy into the space. He belongs here. “We’re gonna take it slow this time.”

As if to prove his point, he spends his sweet-ass time undoing Cas’ shirt, button by button. The shirt’s pretty big on him, hanging over his boxers; Dean could probably slip it off over his head easy. But he’d rather dip his tongue against every newly-exposed inch of skin. He is learning Cas, everywhere.

“I like slow.” Cas slips his hand into Dean’s hair, strokes it until Dean’s practically purring.

“Me too. Don’t go tellin’ anyone, though.”

“Trust me, I was not planning on sharing any details of – you.” Cas’ voice cuts out funny when Dean’s tongue makes a circuit around his navel. Goosebumps pop up in the wake of Dean’s trail, and he moves to taste all of them.

Cas’ boxers slip down inch by inch until they’re gone. Dean tosses them away somewhere -behind his shoulder. He’s pretty sure they end up inside another car’s open window; he’s gonna have to pick them up.

Later. Later, because now, he has Cas spread out, naked, in full. Dean touches him, and if Cas notices that his hands are trembling he thankfully says nothing. His fingers find Cas’ shoulders, his nipples, the spurs of his hipbones. One hand finds Cas’ and holds on tight, fingers braided together as their palms kiss.

With the other free hand, he can’t resist reaching down and touching Cas’ erection. He’s so fucking big. “I want this inside me, okay,” Dean gasps. “Just – slow, remember?”

“Slow.” But Cas sits up to meet Dean in the middle and slips kisses against his mouth. He strokes over Dean’s cock, still inside his boxers. Dean moans into his mouth, surges against him; Cas’ movements are so unhurried, almost lazy, that he seems like he’d be content to do this all day.

Together, their hands push Dean’s shirt off. Cas might not get the thrill of discovering Dean’s skin inch by novel inch, but he does latch onto his nipples the second they toss the shirt onto the garage floor. Fuck. Dean tips his head back and bites his lip and tries to think of a Vetala’s true face so he doesn’t swoop up right up to the edge of coming already.

But fuck that. He can look down and see Cas flick his pink, pink tongue against his nipples a few more times. Until he moves away, soon enough, and Dean wants to whine about it – but then Cas is easing his boxers off his body and out the door.

They’re totally naked. Together.

They might have shared (really, really awesome) orgasms already, but Dean hasn’t had the chance to do this yet. He moves back until he’s lying down again – yeah, the sensation of Baby’s leather seats sliding against his ass never stops feeling totally weird at the same time it turns him the fuck on – and nudges his face into Cas’ neck. He breathes him.

Their bodies roll together, slow. It’s not anything that’s gonna bring anyone off any time soon. But it is enough that a flurry of sparks crackles up behind Dean’s eyes; it’s enough that he has to bite his lip and run his hand up and down the lithe line of Cas’ back.

“Hey, Cas?” he speaks, after a long time. He shifts his head until their eyes meet.

“Yeah?” Cas’ body is long and lean and his eyes are very dark. Dean thrills at the soft slope of his shoulders, knife-edge of his hips, broadness of his thighs. He almost gets too distracted to continue. Almost.

“I just – I need to say this. To you, and not – someone who looks like you. Or a memory of you. And not when either one of us is on our deathbed, Jesus.” He takes a breath. His stomach trembles under Cas’. “I love you. Okay? I – I love you.” He ducks his head and laughs, but draws his eyes back up to meet Cas’ only a beat later. “Love of my life.”

Cas inhales, filling the space between the two of them. “I love you too,” he says, skimming his lips over Dean’s forehead. He kisses the tip of his nose, which isn’t – fine, okay, it’s cute. “I love you.” Lips meet lips; their tongues circle each other. Dean’s already used to Cas’ rhythm.

“Okay, get inside me already,” Dean grumbles when they break apart. He bumps his hips up a couple of times to get the point across, and tries not to laugh.

Cas smiles at him warmly, and presses one brief kiss to his mouth. Then, he drops another under Dean’s ear, over the pulse in his neck; it’s enough to make him shiver. “But that’s missing all the good parts.”

“Hey.”

Cas’ hand slips low, to stroke over the curve of Dean’s ass. “Alright. Not all of them. But you do have many charms.”

“I’m already putting out, not sure why all the flattery’s necessary.” The words start as a tease, but by the time Dean’s done saying them, Cas has slipped three-quarters of the way down his torso, his hands and beautiful fingers following as he goes. So it ends up more of a moan.

Turns out _Cas_ is a big tease when he wants to be. His tongue licks over the shape of Dean’s erection. He tastes him, over and over, long and slow and not the suction Dean needs. “Dammit,” he huffs out, without heat, as another shiver slides up his spine, mirroring the movement of Cas’ tongue.

“Do you need something?” Cas says, too casual. Dean can feel his breath against his dick.

“I hate you.”

“Fairly certain you do not,” Cas says, smiling, before he swallows Dean down.

“ _Oh_ fuck,” Dean exclaims. His hand slams backward, smearing against the window. He’s totally pulling a Winslet in _Titanic_ , but that scene was hot as hell anyway. Not that this isn’t a thousand times hotter.

Cas’ mouth is wide and impossibly warm, easily fitting most of Dean’s cock snug against his tongue. He makes enthusiastic wet noises that echo in the garage and gather tight in Dean’s gut. Inch by glorious, tortured inch, he makes his way up and down. Dean thinks he should get his fingers in Cas’ hair, but he’s so woozy-headed at the sight of Cas’ lips stretched wide around him that all he can do is clutch the Impala’s leather with one hand, and Cas’ shoulder with the other.

“Cas, fuck,” Dean sighs. By the time he’s done getting the words out, Cas’ mouth is off him. “Okay, what the hell –”

“A good warm-up,” Cas says. He’s fuckin’ smirking, because of course he is. There’s a dab of white on his lip.

When Cas sinks back down, he goes lower. His mouth is all over Dean’s _balls_ now, sucking them in their sac and rolling his tongue over them easily. Cas makes happy noises into the soft skin there, noises that buzz all the way through Dean’s body; Dean’s face flushes magenta. He pushes his hips back against Cas’ face and gasps a noise that’s more animal than human moan.

“Are you enjoying this?” Cas’ tone puts a funny judder in Dean’s voice, and his tongue lolls out to taste the space between his balls and ass. Dean can’t see Cas’ face right now, just the top of his head, which is a damn shame. But he hears the smirk in his voice.

“Yeah. Fuck, Cas, _yes_.”

“Can I –”

Now Cas looks up at him, all teasing and grinning gone from his expression. There’s a solemnity across his brow, like they’re churning up something sacred here. Cas spreads Dean’s legs open and leans down once more, to flick his tongue across Dean’s opening.

“ _Yeah_ ,” Dean wheezes out in a voice he doesn’t recognize. “Yeah. God, yes.”

“Good.”

Dean jolts and grunts at the next lap of Cas’ tongue. Cas kisses over his hole, soft, more breath than contact. The Impala’s tires squeak when Dean moves.

“Fuck, please,” Dean begs. He lets his legs fall all the way open, and shivers hard when Cas nudges deeper in, stubble scratching at his cleft.

The tip of Cas’ tongue pushes in, wet against warm.

“ _Cas_.” The word hangs in the air to meet his own panting breath, the slick sounds of Cas’ spit, Baby’s metallic jolts. Dean falls into it.

Cas eats him out fiercely, which shouldn’t be a surprise but still drains away all of Dean’s higher brain functions. The entire world melts away around Dean, until there’s nothing but the throb radiating through his body and the tongue plunging into his ass. His body – shuddering, laid-out, gorgeous in the eyes that matter – keeps him connected to Cas, and that’s all he needs.

It’s so hot, so warm. In every sense of the word. Baby holds his shoulders in place and Cas opens him up with his huge hands, his voracious loving tongue. Dean moans loud enough to rattle his rib cage.

Maybe it’s a few minutes, or maybe it’s an hour, before Cas crooks a finger in alongside his tongue, setting Dean alight with every pass. Dean is so wet from Cas’ mouth, peeled open. Another finger slips inside.

Cas’ rough fingerpads push and rub against Dean’s prostate. That’s it. Game fuckin’ over.

Dean howls as he comes. His fingers scrabble against the door and grab Cas’ skin hard enough to hurt. It feels like his brain is in bloom, the orgasm Cas gave him opening up his entire mind, his whole body, to wild unknown sensations.

A few heaves of breath seem to shake the very walls of the garage. As if in another world, wetness stripes across Dean’s hole, his stomach, over his dick. Cas came too, just from seeing Dean wrecked with what they did together.

Friggin’ _angels_ , Dean manages to think, before another wave swallows him up and pulls him down.

When he comes to, the Impala’s leather sticks to him, all tacky. His ass feels wet-going-cold and _empty_. There’s a tear track leading down from only one of his eyes. Cas stares at him, questioning, and his cooling, drying come against Dean’s dick is almost – uncomfy. The only point of contact they have now is at Dean’s ankle, where Cas’ fingers stroke. They’re going too slow.

There’s physical discomfort, sure. But it’s got nothing on what’s rattling inside his brain. Shame crawls inside, and makes its home too easily. Dean claps his hands over his eyes; he can’t look at Cas right now. God, he came riding his _tongue_ , came whining and writhing and crying about it –

Dean’s thoughts skid to a halt, abruptly, when Cas wraps his fingers around Dean’s wrists. Those fingers are the kind of sticky you only get after saliva’s dried on your skin. Dean’s about to ask Cas what the hell he’s doing, or tell him to stop, when Cas pulls his hands away from his face.

He’s expecting judgement. Harshness. Condescension. But the only thing Cas has for him are soft eyes and a deliciously swollen mouth.

“Sorry,” Dean sputters, and he’s pretty sure that’s the exact wrong thing to say to a dude when he just came because he got off so hard on getting _him_ off. But he’s actually laughing now, low, mostly to himself. The side of Cas’ mouth lifts up just a fraction of an inch. “I was just, uh, stuck in my own head a bit.”

“Did that feel good?” Cas’ fingers circle the bony part of his ankle, around and around. “Not the part where you were inside your head, what we did before that.”

“Amazing,” Dean answers automatically.

“That should be what matters,” Cas tells him. “I know – I know it’s not that easy. To accept what you want, sometimes. I might have always loved you, but sometimes I fought against it. You were so beautiful, and it was impossible that you’d love me back.”

“It’s not,” Dean says. His words sound more like a dreamy sigh. More embarrassing shit.

“I know.” Cas’ hand finds Dean’s cheek and strokes, once. “I’m not judging you, Dean.”

The last couple of words make the shame inside Dean deflate. It’ll always be there, a scar from a wound the world picked at too much, but sometimes it’s more faded than others. Those times are okay.

“How are you so good at speeches for a naked guy,” Dean grouches, his way of acknowledging it. “You got your rocks off, too, huh? Guess we have some time to kill ‘til the main act.”

Cas’ smile goes from warm to wicked. “Angel, remember?” He’s kissing Dean then, dick plumping up again against Dean’s thigh. Dean can’t help but rub them together a little, harder than he’d go if he didn’t want Cas coming another time, but apparently he can fill ‘er up as many times as he wants to. “How do you want to do this?”

Dean starts laughing, from his throat and gut. He laughs right against Cas’ lips, letting him swallow them right up. Cas gives him one of his questioning looks when they break apart; it’s kinda sexy, now that he’s naked. “No, it’s great, it’s just – I wanna do this every way.”

“Me too,” Cas says, between presses of their lips. “I’ve thought about it. Often.”

“You thought about sex in the Impala?!”

“Constantly.” Cas lowers his hand again. His fingers got slippery with lube at some point. Again, angel. “It was very distracting. You generally are.”

Two fingers push inside Dean. Greedy for their easy intrusion, Dean shoves his hips back against them instantly. They’re so wide and long, impossibly – inhumanly – warm. If Cas could get him off with just his tongue, he could definitely do it with his fingers.

“I might’ve thought about it too.” Dean’s got no idea how he’s forming words right now. His brain’s on a pleasure-drowned vacation.

Cas spreads him open and Dean goes with it, so easy for him. He uses a lot of lube, enough that it drips down from Dean’s body, and touches Dean everywhere while he opens him up. Dean shivers when Cas skims his collarbone; he’s man enough to admit he _whimpers_ when Cas leans in to bite at the little nudge of extra fat under his chin.

Cas’ middle finger pushes directly against the sweet, hard bud of nerves inside him, and the whimper turns into a shout. When the fizzle behind his eyes fades, Dean looks up to Cas. His pupils flick between Dean’s face and where the two of them join together, wonder softening every feature.

“Are you ready?” Cas asks, after a few minutes. It brings Dean down from riding the waves of sheer bliss, almost ready to crest again. He actually has to gather his breath for a couple of seconds.

“Only for like a decade now.” He tries to keep his voice light, and succeeds. Mostly.

Cas rolls his eyes in return, but there’s nothing mean about it. Not with his face lit up the way it is, not with the true smile on his face. Even in the harsh overhead light of the garage, Cas is beautiful. “Angels were never supposed to feel anything,” he says, pulling his fingers out. Dean hates how empty that leaves him. “But I know this more than anything else.”

Dean smiles, and he senses the way it crinkles the skin at the edges of his eyes. “Get in me, then,” he practically whispers, propping himself up best as he can to kiss Cas long and wet.

When they separate, Dean slides his legs open more, as wide as they’ll go. It lets Cas nudge his way right between them. He props one of Dean’s legs over his shoulder, and kisses his ankle. Dean could fuckin’ weep about it.

Cas’ thick cockhead nudges at his entrance a couple of times. Just the tip slips in; they’re both so slippery where they yearn to meet, that was probably inevitable. Then, with one long push, Cas slides all the way home.

Dean rushes out an exhale. Cas really is huge, and it’s been a while, so right now it feels like the first thrust just kinda – split him open. With Cas seated inside him like this, Dean’s skin starts itching for more. A constellation of goosebumps pops up across his arms and chest.

But then Cas throbs, deep and wet. It reminds Dean that they’re bare skin against bare skin, and he’s never done it like this before. The squirm fades away to honeyed lava, gathered right in his gut.

Cas leans in to kiss him at the same time he starts moving. Dean goes with it, goes and goes, lifting his head and rolling his hips back to meet Cas everywhere. Dean feels full. And God, he’s gettin’ to be a sap in his old age, because he feels _complete_.

“You’re amazing,” Cas gasps. His lips bump Dean’s chin, his cheek, his eyebrow. “I – I – nothing in my wildest dreams was like you, Dean.”

Dean wishes he had something smart to volley right back to Cas, but all he can do is pant against his cheek and breathe into his mouth. He slides his hand backwards, grabbing the Impala’s seat too hard. Distantly, he hopes he doesn’t fuck up the leather. “Cas, I – fuck – you wanna talk amazing, let’s talk about you and that _dick_ of yours, keep going, God, please –”

Cas fucks him into a wail that, Dean dares say, Robert Plant would be proud of.

Dean’s not surprised at how ferociously Cas drives into him. Cas ain’t the type to do anything halfway, whether it’s fucking or _loving_. There’s nothing violent in his rhythm, but it’s fierce enough to send Dean’s whole body into a frenzy of pleasure. Cas slides up against Dean’s prostate easy with every pass; Dean’s toes curl, tight. Cas’ hips snap, a dirty stuttered rhythm almost enough to bring Dean off on its own.

“Dude,” Dean huffs out, looking down at his own cock. It’s at three-quarter mast already, and every thrust makes it fatten up a little more. It can’t have been even twenty minutes since he came. “Are you, uh, using your mojo on me?”

Cas looks down with way more reverence than the moment deserves. Or maybe not. Maybe just the right amount. “No,” he says, “I wouldn’t do that without permission. You’re doing this on your own.”

“You got permission,” Dean says with a gasp, and then he laughs. “That look. You love my dick.”

Cas smiles at that. “I do,” he says earnestly. He meets Dean in another kiss, wrapping his tongue around Dean’s own. His hand moves to Dean’s now-jutting erection, and Dean see-saws, desperate, between Cas’ thrusts and his strokes. Ecstasy spirals higher and higher inside his body.

“Fuck,” Dean whines. “I’m gonna…”

“Please.”

For the second time in the last hour, orgasm pours down on him, pours _from_ him, a flash flood of physicality and emotion alike. It seeps out from between Cas’ strong tan fingers, dripping onto Baby’s upholstery, and that’s the last coherent thought Dean has for a long time. He’s never come like this before, roll after roll of shudders wracking him.

He’s intoxicated with it, muscles going loose as a flowing stream. Cas could do whatever he wanted with Dean when he’s like this. But what he does is keep thrusting into him. Long shoves, now, hissed breath between every push, but steady.

Dean frames Cas’ face with his hands. His fingertips still tingle. God, his leg aches from the way Cas hoisted it up, but it’s good, it’s so good for him. “I love you,” Dean says, staring into Cas’ eyes, blue blown black. With a groan loud enough to rattle the Impala’s framework, Cas comes inside Dean.

Cas trembles. He’s doing a much better job keeping it together than he did earlier, when he came with half a blowjob, but he’s falling to bits now. He moans Dean’s name loud and deep enough that Baby’s frame shudders with it. Loud and deep enough that Dean could swear his _soul_ shivers.

Dean makes a stupidly high noise in his throat when Cas pulls away, even if his hips kept kickin’ until he was too soft to stay inside Dean’s ass. The thrill picks up again when Cas curls around him, best he can in the backseat. It’s big, but not big enough for them. Dean doesn’t give a shit right now, he just needs contact.

“We could do that again, if you want,” Cas murmurs. He sounds just as drunk as Dean does. “Right now.”

“Rain check,” is all Dean can get out, finally letting his head thunk back against the Impala’s seat.

Cas _mmm_ s in agreement into Dean’s hair. It’s cramped back here. They’re gonna have to move. Soon. Eventually.

“I created you from nothing,” Cas says, eventually. Sleep hazes over his voice. “Just your soul and stardust. It was the most incredible experience of my entire existence to that point.”

“Cas.” Dean wracks what’s left of his brain for some stupid joke, but all he can do is breathe his name.

Cas speaks up again, quickly. “It had nothing on this.”

The silence, comfortable, grows between them, until Dean rolls Cas against his side. Their stomachs move together on every breath. “I missed you so much, man,” Dean says, at last. “Not just the past few months, but every time you –”

“I know.” Cas curls in against him, until their chests are pushed together. “I’m –”

“No, hey. We’re square. Not like I didn’t –”

“Square,” Cas repeats, a smile poking up the corners of his mouth.

“Okay.” As usual, Dean’s shit at taking his own advice. But he’ll try. He’s gonna try. “I’m just glad you’re here. I’m gonna keep saying that. I didn’t need – this. I just needed you.”

“Are you complaining about this, though?” Cas’ smile is now full-on, enough that a gummy grin’s taking up most of the lower half of his face.

Dean laughs, and kisses up that smile. “Definitely not complaining,” he says against Cas’ lips.

Cas keeps trembling with the aftershocks, and Dean could use a massage to work out the stiffness in his joints. Poor Baby’s got sweat streaked against her upholstery and come all over; Dean owes her a good scrubbing and a half.

Worth it, though. Actually pretty perfect.

 

*****

 

Dean sleeps. Cas watches him. Many things change; some do not.

Cas doesn’t need to sleep, not as an angel. But he doesn’t _need_ to eat Dean’s burgers or make love to him, either. All of those actions have been extremely enjoyable, so he continues to do them.

He blinks out of sleep earlier than Dean does, due to lack of necessity, but he doesn’t mind since it allows him to prop himself up on one elbow and study Dean’s face. Of course, he’s memorized all his features the way only an angel can, to the point where Cas can tell if Dean’s lost one stray golden eyelash. Cas knows the month of the year based on the shade of Dean’s freckles.

Cas knows Dean’s face so well that he should be used to it by now. And yet, every time he focuses his sight on Dean’s gilt visage, it steals the breath from his lungs. He feels his heart stutter. Such things should not affect an angel, Cas knows, but he’s also long past caring.

Dean’s lips and eyelids twitch minutely in sleep, but other than that he’s more still than he ever is. His slack face is beautiful, so beautiful, in its relaxation. Dean’s dreams can be upsetting, so Cas is glad he’s here, to skim fingers over Dean’s forehead and chase away the nightmares to bring him restful sleep. He’s extremely happy they finally made their way back to Dean’s bed, for the sake of Dean’s comfort.

He will ask Dean about somnophilia later. He needs his consent, but them joined together, while Dean’s as particularly beautiful as he is while dozing –

A reasonable creature would tell Cas he had his fill of Dean last night. But Cas is long past the point where he was ever reasonable about Dean Winchester, and maybe he never was. He dips his fingers down, teasing his own stomach for a few seconds before he starts lazily pumping himself.

Dean is warmth personified, in his smiles and his hands and the way his eyes crinkle, the heartbreaking amount of care he has for everyone on this earth. Cas still tries to emulate that. But right now, Dean is _physical_ warmth, his body giving off the heated satisfaction he must feel in his sleep, and Cas is happy to roll along with it.

His balls are tight against his body now, after only a few firm strokes. Proximity to Dean is very, very arousing. Dean stretches his arms, still sleeping, and Cas picks up his pace, panting hard –

“Good morning,” Dean says, grinning all the way while Cas exhausts his spend, at that very moment, onto his stomach. “Oh, very good.”

Cas leans in to kiss the smile from his face. “I thought you were asleep through _some_ of that.”

“I was.” Dean leans back, snuggling into his pillow. Lazily, he collects Cas’ release with his fingers, and suckles on them. Cas could bring his own erection back any time he liked, but it’s not the control he has over his body that makes his cock twitch at that. “You makin’ those noises, though…”

Dean slides down so that he’s fully under Cas. His erection, now alert and full, rubs slippery at Cas’ perineum. It feels so good, just like that, Cas’ nervous system still shimmering with orgasm and the two of them connected in ways Cas has never known before with anyone. He’s reaching down to bring Dean to completion himself, but Dean shoots him a sleepy smile.

“Lemme do all the work,” he says to Cas, kissing under his chin. He rolls his hips, making gorgeous noises as he goes. Cas tilts his legs and groin best he can, wanting to give Dean the best angle, and Dean makes a gorgeous stuttered breath and orgasms all over the sheets and between Cas’ legs alike.

Cas wonders how something so dirty can thrill him so much as Dean comes down, panting. Dean’s tempting mouth is stuck in an O shape and his hair is spiked with sweat and he shivers. Cas gets to see this for the rest of his existence.

“Really good morning,” Dean repeats, and rolls onto his side so he can embrace Cas from that angle. Cas has always noticed how much Dean craves physical contact, but he couldn’t imagine the ecstasy involved in receiving his touches constantly. The synapses inside his human brain fire off enough oxytocin and dopamine to drown him. What’s left of his wings flutters joyously.

But in this room, he stays silent. Statue-still. He lets himself soak in this, though he’ll never deserve it.

“Time ‘zit?” Dean asks, voice lazy and stunning.

Cas glances over at the time. It’s just past seven in the morning; they have plenty of time to rest yet. “Early. We can still sleep.”

“Awesome.” Dean’s grinning with all his teeth, the smile lighting up his eyes into whiskey gold and green. An impossible, beautiful human. Someone Cas will never understand, strives to understand, understands more than he knows anything else.

There’s one thing Cas wants to make very clear before they return to sleep. Something he should have said already, the first thing he should have said once he received Castiel’s memories. He strokes his fingers through Dean’s hair; the contact settles him and puts jumpy anticipation in his stomach alike. “Before I died. You were the last thing I thought of –”

“Cas, hey.” Dean gathers him against his side. Cas is aware they can’t really get closer, but the way the two of them have been touching each other since Cas returned from the other universes, even before they were sexually intimate – if there was some way they could fold the other into their physical forms, Cas is fairly sure the two of them would have done it already. “We don’t have to talk about that.”

“I want to, now,” Cas insists, and Dean swallows hard but lets him continue. “I need to tell you something. I felt the blade in my heart. My grace was going supernova. And all I could think was, in the end, I lived a good life. I may have doubted it before, but I had lived a worthy life. My life had true family, it had joy, it had _love_. And so much – so much – of it was thanks to you, Dean.”

Cas knows his eyes are wet when his short speech ends; his voice quivers. When he casts a look over to Dean, though, it’s a relief to see he’s in a similar state. “I –”

“I know you worried about it, corrupting me. You worried you ruined my life.” Dean’s preoccupation with this made little sense to Cas, considering his lack of respect for angels overall, but Cas had always been touched by how much he cared. And Dean’s many idiosyncrasies were so much of why he fell for him, sudden and slow at once and like nothing he had ever experienced. “You talked about it with the other version of me. But Dean, you are the best part of my life.”

“Sweet talker.” Cas thinks that will be all Dean says, but he surprises him – Dean is always, always surprising him, frequently in the best ways – by continuing. “I never thought – I mean, God, when you walked into that barn when Bobby and I summoned you, I was scared out of my mind, however much I tried to hide it –”

“You didn’t hide it very well.”

“Keep it up and I’m pullin’ a Lysistrata,” Dean grumbles with a great deal of fondness in his voice. “But, yeah, you threatened to throw me into Hell a couple of days later. Never could have imagined – I mean, not even _this_ , though it’s pretty damn awesome. Just that you’d become my best friend. That half the time, an _angel_ would tell me it was okay to feel what I did. My life was always pretty messed up, but that, I didn’t mind so much.”

“I’m flattered, but don’t give me so much credit. You feel more than anyone else I’ve ever known, Dean. Possibly more than anyone else on the planet.”

Dean puts his hand on the fleshy part of Cas’ ass and squeezes, affectionate. “I’ll show you feeling.”

“Your puns are delightful. I have something for you.” Thankfully, his coat – he’s grown too attached to it, however ugly, to give it up – hasn’t fallen far from the bed. He unhooks the button holding the inside breast pocket, right against his heart, open, and fishes out what’s inside.

Cas holds out the tape to Dean. It’s nearly identical in appearance to the tape Dean gave him, now safely held in the tape deck of his truck, only the front of this tape reads _Cas’ Golden Oldies_ in his own spindly handwriting. The title isn’t exactly accurate, since songs Cas would consider old date from before human existence, but he figures it will amuse Dean.

“Cas, I told you, you can keep the tape,” Dean says, and even though he’s still half-asleep the hurt in his voice is evident. It’s happened before, but as usual, Cas is struck by how fervently he wants to wipe away that hurt from Dean entirely. “Or we can listen to it together, whatever you want –”

“It’s a tape of my own,” Cas tells him. Smiling, he adds, “A gift. I did bring something for you, this time.”

Realization dawns on Dean’s face, a beautiful light through his tired visage. “Just thought it was my tape,” Dean murmurs as he flips it back and forth in his hands a couple of times. He chuckles, even more endearing than usual in his sleep-rough tone. “Nice title.”

“Kelly did help me with it,” Cas admits. She may have called him hopeless at the time, but she was smiling when she did, and she’d pushed his shoulder afterward in a friendly way.

“Well, tell her thanks. We owe her a lot.”

“I will. The music choices, though, those were all mine.”

Dean raises an eyebrow at Cas. “Is there any sad – indie –”

Cas smiles warmly. He knew that question was coming. “No, Dean.” He pauses in mock-thought. “I might have put Snow Patrol on there. But that one song you like –”

The expression on Dean’s face is truly priceless. Doubly so when he realizes Cas is teasing. “Can’t believe the sense of humor you got,” he grumbles, voice blooming with warmth even as he says it. “Like I wasn’t enough of a goner for you anyway.”

The words thrill Cas to his core. Dean’s open desire for everything about Cas is more than he could have ever asked for, and he has never felt something so wonderful in all the many eons he’s lived. He will never take it for granted.

After a few moments of the two of them resting against each other, Dean finally manages to rouse himself from the sheets to shuffle around his room in search of a cassette player stashed in one of his drawers. He doesn’t find it necessary to put on clothing in order to do this; Cas props himself up on one elbow and appreciates Dean’s wide back, strong shoulders, and the curve of his ass and legs. His vulnerability.

Dean is back in bed when the first strains of the opening song begin. He lets out an open, big groan before the first lyric even comes out of the speaker. _Hey, what’s the matter with your head?_

“Cas, you big sap,” he teases, pulling Cas closer to him even as he says it. “Biting off _Guardians_ , really.”

“That movie came out after Metatron downloaded all known popular culture into my mind,” Cas says truthfully, “so I’m not sure what I’m _biting off_. I’d enjoy watching the movie with you.”

Cas always thought it was impossible for a sun to brighten more, but somehow, every time Dean stumbles across a simple pleasure, the light in him only glows stronger. “Later, for sure. But we gotta _watch the movie_ , man. Plenty of time afterward to…” He trails off, but the grin has returned to his face.

“I’d enjoy that. Any time spent with you is good.” Like many other times, Cas is just saying how he feels, but Dean still beautifully flushes and ducks his head. Cas relishes the opportunity to pull Dean against him, until their heartbeats thump together. His own heartbeat is entirely unnecessary, Cas knows, but in moments like this, it seems essential. “We should rest while we have the opportunity.”

“Don’t have to tell me twice. Love you.” He kisses the corner of Cas’ mouth – even brief and off-center, it makes a thrill reverberate through Cas’ grace – and then he’s off to sleep again.

Cas knows enough to know that, however perfect this moment may be, life will not stay perfect forever. He can’t tear every nightmare out of the Winchesters’ heads, or protect them from every danger. Dean, Sam, and Mary, not to mention himself – their lives have never been steady. Their pasts are ugly, and the future is never certain.

But from that ugly past came his bonds with all of them. As for the future, they’ll face it together. He’s realized of late that a preordained future is overrated, anyway.

Cas wonders what the other Castiel, the one from the alternate universe, would have thought of fate. Much like himself, Cas is fairly certain Castiel would have embraced it when he first came to this dimension, even at the cost of his own existence. But now that he’s returned to his own – likely not.

Cas lets his thoughts turn toward Castiel. He hopes he’s alright. But nothing is preordained for any of them, which makes life terrifying. It makes it wonderful.

The majority of the other Castiel’s memories had been extremely unpleasant. Cas was used to war, of course, but his type of war was the metaphysical type. He was used to combatants thrashing their grace against each other on another plane of existence, sending stars swinging wildly through the galaxy. He was familiar with hand-to-hand combat, of course, but angel combat resembled dance more than the battle to the death it truly was.

Castiel’s type of war was one full of bullets, the metallic tang of blood, the desperate white-knuckling of deprivation and never knowing if the dawn of a new day might be the last. It’s the kind of war the Winchesters – Dean – would be extremely proficient at, but that Cas hopes they never have to go through again.

Cas is not sure if Castiel’s time in this dimension was at all enjoyable. He spent most of his time here in one of the basement’s tiny rooms, in chains. Castiel understood why he was there, but it would have made it no better. So many sights to see, here on this earth, and Castiel saw only four gray brick walls. Then again, Cas thinks of how Dean dominates Castiel’s memories, and he hopes that in the end, Castiel did find some value in this world.

Cas holds Castiel’s memories close to him. He wishes, so badly, that Dean wasn’t in such anguish when he said the things he did, but those days are past them now and it’s a wonder to roll his words over and over in his mind.

Cas plans to let Dean sleep for a few hours, so he picks one of Castiel’s more pleasant memories to revisit. Smiling, he lets it sift through him.

 

*****

 

Castiel notices the sky first. Only a few wispy clouds hover among the sweet cornflower blue, drifting slowly. The air is clean. There is no smog to obscure anything, and so when he looks out over the sparkling bay, he can see how mountain peaks lift gently up from the earth on the opposite side of the beach.

It’s a beautiful world. It is calm, peace, serenity: words and feelings Castiel learned from whispers among his sisters in moments when they were not otherwise engaged in battle, but has never experienced. And he completely hates it.

The next thing Castiel notices is the pair of angel wings charred into the ground. He’s certainly seen that before. But there is something deeply _wrong_ to see such a sight in this world, where everything is so pristine it might as well be a crystal he’d long to shatter.

“Is this your dimension?” Castiel asks at last. It’s a foolish question, but he asks it anyway, at the sight of the angel wings spread out below his feet. Those wings must have belonged to the Castiel Mary knew, the one she called _Cas_ so repulsively casually, but they’re so out of place in this placid world that he can’t help but feel like he dragged those wings here himself.

“It is. It’s home.” She’s breathing very hard.

Castiel is stumbling over what to say next, when a man runs out of the nearby house. He rushes out with a gun, but he drops it the second he sees Mary. Castiel has never seen anyone voluntarily give up a weapon; instantly, he knows this must be one of Mary’s sons. The newcomer is tall for a human, and his soul sparks gold and black alike. Mary’s soul has the same tawny colors, and when they embrace the colors clash hard against each other until they melt into a whole new shade of yellow-orange. Almost like a fire.

Castiel looks down. His grace overloads with colors and sensations; this world is overstuffed with too much. He has no idea how anyone is supposed to survive in this universe. How these humans weren’t all cut down by the first thing with claws and teeth that emerged from the shadows. How the angels didn’t turn everyone who tread on this planet into a smoking crater just to prove that wrath still existed in this world and glory higher than ancient mountains and lakes did too.

Mary pulls at Castiel, breaking him from his thoughts. He looks up, and his robes slide off his face. The sun hits him, and he growls. The sun’s been blocked out for thousands of years in his universe.

Mary’s son – Sam, something whispers to Castiel – looks shocked. Human emotions are truly excessive, exaggerated and grotesque and an obvious weakness. “Mom, you didn’t –”

“I had to.”

Mary didn’t have to. Castiel saw her battle. He saw her kill.

Hannah was a good warrior, but her years on the throne changed her. She’d kissed his forehead before sending him off with a human like Mary; it was a strange enough gesture to unsettle Castiel more than leaving with Mary did, and he’d thought he was headed to a certain death at the time.

Mary likely could have dumped out the heads of Azazel and the imposter Lucifer, murdered Hannah, and claimed victory over all of Heaven. It’s blasphemy to think it, but Castiel is never returning home. He finds himself unfazed by the thought of punishment there.

That’s even worse blasphemy, not living in fear of the rulers of Heaven.

Castiel becomes aware Sam is gesturing at him. He doesn’t return it, because he feels nothing for this man.

The three of them walk to the house. More accurately, Mary and Sam walk, and Castiel follows. They are sure to talk in low voices, like he won’t be able to hear them. Not that it matters. He has no idea what they’re talking about. The word _Cas_ piques his interest, but that’s all.

The emotion and care in their voices pull at their words. Mary wraps her arm around Sam, and knocks their heads together, gently. Castiel wrinkles his nose and keeps walking. Sam holds the door open for him when they get to the house, but Castiel ignores his movement and steps inside all on his own.

Castiel had seen a few humans from his own universe before he saw Mary. Their lives ground their souls down to nothing, and the ash from the atmosphere sunk into them too; their souls were burbling rivers of black, and red so dark it may well have been black as well.

Mary was a jarring exclamation point on the landscape. There was darkness in her soul, and a haze that had nothing to do with the soot in the sky blotted parts out. But red and gold and bronze still wrestled proudly within her. Yellow shot across her features. She carried the sweet green of plants Castiel had an intrinsic knowledge of, but had never seen. Before she arrived in Heaven, there were whispers among the other angels of a killer who struck angels down while they were still in awe of her soul.

Something had gnawed on Sam’s soul; the crackling sparks shooting out of him seemed fewer in number than they should be, and the edges were irregular even while they wildly undulated. But the gold and black of his soul shined alike. There was purple, too, studded with a light all its own. He glowed glorious, even with the damage.

They both were a riot of color, brighter than anything Castiel or any angel had seen in hundreds of years; they were beautiful, even if Castiel was loathe to admit it.

Neither of them have anything on the man waiting in the room.

A terrible thing is etched on his human face, pain and loss so nakedly obvious Castiel’s embarrassed to see it. It feels private. Less private is the golden glow that haloes him, and the way his soul stretches out to Castiel, long searching tendrils that radiate bright enough to steal the air from his lungs.

His soul, Dean’s soul, is beautiful.

That one word encompasses everything about it, and yet could never sufficiently describe the glory Castiel experiences. There is damage in this soul; whole chunks have been ripped from it, and many of the colors are set over with a dark tone. But none of that damage can mar its beauty; if anything, it just makes it more miraculous.

Every color screams at Castiel, from soft pastels that steam into the air until they vanish to nothing, to the rich jewel tones that wrap around Dean’s heart. Bright primary colors churn around and around like one human could contain whole oceans. The colors reach and stretch. They _yearn_ , something Castiel cannot truly comprehend because he’s never felt it himself. But he looks upon Dean and he understands.

There is no way Castiel has ever seen such a riot of color and beauty before. He’s surprised he doesn’t collapse with the force of it. But as Dean’s soul settles into his vision, both in Castiel’s human form and his true form, shuddering under the loveliness of what it sees, it fills him with a deep sense of familiarity to twine aside the wonder. He _knows_ Dean, somehow. He has known him a thousand times. Castiel lives inside this soul already, a tiny white-blue heartbeat beating continuously inside the gorgeous panoply.

Dean’s moving, he’s walking away. Castiel should despair at that. But he doesn’t. Instead, warmth crackles through his body. He’s never felt this sensation before, like the sun from this universe found a home inside him.

No, Castiel does not feel despair. What he feels is something else entirely, a stranger to him but an entity that’s shockingly correct, from his grace to the processes in his brain to his beating heart.

For the first time, Castiel believes in hope.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks again for reading, friends! Come say hi on [Tumblr](http://hufflepuffdean.tumblr.com) if you want.
> 
> You wanna listen to [Cas' Golden Oldies](https://open.spotify.com/user/4dcbb17/playlist/1edTt8uQzrcIWiJ5VjiNEu)? I got you.


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